Harry Potter: A Slytherin Tale
by RhamielAngel
Summary: A "Harry gets sorted into Slytherin instead of Gryffindor" fic, meant to parallel Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
1. Platform Nine and ThreeQuarters

**Authors' Note: **(Skip if impatient. Don't worry, we'll still be here :)

As you've probably already guessed, this is another "Harry gets sorted into Slytherin instead of Gryiffindor" fic. However, unlike other fics of that nature, A Slytherin Tale was designed to be a perfect reflection of JK Rowling's original piece: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. It was made for the purpose of being so canon, that it would seem as if the great Authoress herself had crafted it. Therefore, some passages include _word-for-word _text from the original story. Sometimes, it's only a sentence, other times it's whole pages. So we take a moment to say that we do not own any of JK Rowlings works or characters. (Boy that gets old doesn't it?)

**OC Alert: **(This is important.) There are OCs in this fic, however this fic is NOT about OCs (NO MARY-SUES). This is still Harry Potter's story. The OCs exist to complete the dynamic of the original story. In particular, there is an OC who will play a large role in that she basically takes the place of Hermione from the original text. We did this in order to keep the same "group of three friends" dynamic so that Harry didn't have too much time to mope around by himself. Therefore, in this fic: Draco will take the place of Ron and an OC will play Hermione's role. (We could have used Pansy, but she's such a drip! Plus, she's useful in later chapters.) Feel free, actually we encourage you, to criticize the OC in reviews. Tell us if she's too over the top or too under the bottom and we will try to adapt her accordingly so that she convincingly fits in with the cast.

**In Regards to Publishing: **You should know that this story is ENTIRELY COMPLETE. That means, all we have to do is click the publish button for each of the twelve chapters. This is your insurance that we will NOT flake out in this fic and leave it half-published and only work on it every two years. We will publish the completed chapter at our leisure (so probably two or three chaps a week or as it suits us). If you like this fic, we will be much obliged to work on a sequel as well.

**Lastly: **There would be no use in starting from the beginning, since the first ten chapters or so of the fic would be exactly the same as the first ten from the original work. Therefore, the story begins in the first place where our alterations begin to take place to change Harry's destiny forever: in this case, King's Cross

We are Sensei and Rhamiel, and we hope you enjoy our rendition of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone: A Slytherin Tale.

* * *

They reached King's Cross at half past ten. Uncle Vernon dumped Harry's trunk onto a cart and wheeled it into the station for him. Harry thought this was strangely kind until Uncle Vernon stopped dead, facing the platforms with a nasty grin on his face.

"Well, there you are, boy. Platform nine – platform ten. Your platform should be somewhere in the middle, but they don't seem to have built it yet, do they?"

He was quite right, of course. There was a big plastic number nine over one platform and a big plastic ten over the one next to it, and in the middle, nothing at all.

"Have a good term," said Uncle Vernon with an even nastier smile. He left without another word. Harry turned and saw the Dursleys drive away. All three of them were laughing. Harry's mouth went rather dry. What on earth was he going to do? He was starting to attract a lot of funny looks, because of Hedwig.

At that moment a group of people passed just behind him and he caught a few words of what they were saying.

"-packed with Muggles, of course –"

Harry swung round. The speaker was a plump woman who was talking to four boys, all with flaming red hair. Each of them was pushing a trunk like Harry's in front of him – and they had an _owl._

Heart hammering, Harry pushed his cart after them. They stopped and so did he, just near enough to hear what they were saying.

"Now, what's the platform number?" said the boy's mother.

"Nine and three-quarters!" piped a small girl, also red-headed, who was holding her hand, "Mom, can't I go…"

"You're not old enough, Ginny, now be quiet. All right, Percy, you go first."

What looked like the oldest boy marched toward platforms nine and ten. Harry watched, careful not to blink in case he missed it – but just as the boy reached the dividing barrier between the two platforms, a large crowd of tourists came swarming in front of him and by the time the last backpack had cleared away, the boy had vanished.

The twins came next, both vanishing like their brother before. Now the third brother was walking briskly toward the barrier – he was almost there – and then, quite suddenly, he wasn't anywhere.

There was nothing else for it.

Harry stepped forward to ask the plump woman for help, but in his hurry he tripped on the corner of his cart and fell ungraciously into someone else.

"Hey, watch it!" a voice protested. Both Harry and the victim scurried into standing positions. The boy Harry had practically trampled had a pale, pointed face which was, at the moment, twisted into a sneer.

"Sorry." Harry mumbled and wiped himself off. "I was just… I'm going to-"

"Hogwarts?" the boy asked. He was eyeing Harry carefully.

"Yes," said Harry. He remembered, at once, his dilemma in getting to platform nine and three-quarters and turned to see if the plump woman was still next to platform ten. To his dismay, the entire red-haired family had vanished.

"Draco, I expected you to have your things loaded onto the train by now." A couple strode up, obviously the boy's parents. The man had the same pointed face and fair hair, which was long and hung to his shoulders. He also walked with an ornate walking stick. The woman was tall and proper with her nose in the air, as if the smell of Muggles quite disgusted her.

"I got held up," Draco said in a drawl, casting an accusing glance at Harry.

"I'm sorry," Harry apologized again, "I was just trying to find out how to get to-"

"Platform nine and three-quarters?" the man interrupted. "Show him how it's done, Draco."

The boy obeyed. He stepped in front of the wall between platforms nine and ten, took a deep breath, and pushed his cart _through _the wall.

"Go ahead now," the woman advised, placing a delicate hand on Harry's shoulder. "The train leaves in less than ten minutes."

He pushed the trolley around and stared at the barrier. It looked very solid.

He started to walk toward it. People jostled him on their way to platforms nine and ten. Harry walked more quickly. He was going to smash right into the barrier and then he'd be in trouble – leaning forward on his cart, he broke into a heavy run – the barrier was coming nearer and nearer – he wouldn't be able to stop – the cart was out of control – he was a foot away – he closed his eyes, ready for the crash –

It didn't come. . . he kept on running . . . he opened his eyes.

A scarlet steam engine was waiting next to a platform packed with people. A sign overhead said Hogwarts Express, eleven o' clock. Harry looked behind him and saw a wrought – iron archway where the barrier had been, with the words _Platform Nine and Three-Quarters _on it. He had done it.

The first few carriages were already packed with students, some hanging out of the window to talk to their families, some fighting over seats. Harry pushed his cart off down the platform in search of an empty seat.

He pressed on through the crowd until he found an empty compartment near the end of the train. He put Hedwig inside first and then started to shove and heave his trunk toward the train door. He tried to lift it up the steps but could hardly raise one end and twice he dropped it painfully on his foot. At last, his trunk was tucked away in the corner of the compartment.

He sat down next to the window where, half hidden, he could watch the people outside the train. He quickly caught sight of the boy he'd run into near the platforms. The boy's mother gently touched her son's face and smiled.

"My precious boy's first year of school," she said, pride in her voice.

"Mother…" the boy complained and pulled away from her. "I'm not your precious boy anymore!"

"Draco," the father spoke next. His face was sterner than the mother's, and far less excited for his son's departure. "There have been rumors that Harry Potter will be attending Hogwarts this year. It would be in your best interest, if the rumors are true, to try and make his acquaintance."

The boy gave an expression of irritation.

"All I ever hear about is Harry Potter!" he complained, "Not sure what the attraction is, personally."

Harry had been thinking the exact same thing. He wasn't used to all of this attention he'd been getting whenever he was in the wizarding world. He had quite hoped it might have worn off a bit in the last month since he'd been to Diagon Alley. Apparently, it had not.

"Oh, Lucius, let him be," the woman chided. "Today is Draco's day and it would be in your best interest to wish him luck before he's off."

The man regarded both his wife and his son for a long moment and then finally seemed to deflate a bit.

"Good luck, son," his voice was low, but somewhat softer, "We'll be waiting to hear if you've made it into Slytherin."

"Of course I'll be in Slytherin," the boy scoffed.

He suffered a kiss on the cheek from his mother and allowed his father to pat his shoulder before he clambered onto the train.

"Be safe, dear," his mother called.

The train began to move. Harry watched the faces of the mother and father disappear as the train rounded the corner. Houses flashed past the window. Harry felt a great leap of excitement. He didn't know what he was going to – but it had to be better than what he was leaving behind.

The door of the compartment slid open and the pale boy came in, looking thoroughly annoyed.

"You again," he stated when he saw Harry. "That is," he sighed, "Is there anyone sitting here?" he asked, pointing at the seat opposite Harry. "The other compartments are full."

Harry shook his head and the boy sat down. He glanced at Harry and looked, bored, out the window. Perhaps he was unimpressed with the scenery, for he quickly turned his focus back to Harry.

"Hello, I don't think we've been properly introduced," a light smile touched his lips, "I'm Malfoy. Draco Malfoy."

"I'm Har-" before he could finish, the compartment doors slid open again this time to reveal two thickset boys who looked extremely mean. Harry started, immediately on edge. These looked like the kind of boys Dudley might order to pick on him. To his surprise, Draco glanced up and waved the boys off in annoyance.

"Crabbe, Goyle, what do you want?" he asked.

"We were just looking for you." The taller of the boys said.

"Wanted to say we're sorry that the compartment is full," the second said, "If you want, we could sit in here-"

"There's no need," the boy said, carelessly. Again he waved them off and this time they slid the door shut and left.

"You were saying?" he turned back to Harry. "Oh, those were Crabbe and Goyle, acquaintances of mine. Well, partly, I suppose. My father is friends with their fathers and I know them through association."

Harry couldn't help but think that they looked more like body guards than friends, but he chose not to mention this. Instead, he relaxed in his seat and wiped his forehead with his sleeve, feeling that he could relax with the bully-looking boys gone.

Draco gasped. Harry jerked at once.

"You're _him_, aren't you? You're Harry Potter."

Harry attempted to push his bangs back over his scar, knowing that it was too late. He nodded.

"And that scar… That's from when You-Know-Who-"

"Yes," said Harry, "but I can't remember it."

They sat in silence for a moment. Draco seemed to be seeing Harry for the first time. He regarded him carefully and with a guarded expression.

"You're famous, you know." Draco said.

"Yes, but I'm not exactly sure how surviving an attack when I was baby is enough to make me famous." Harry replied.

"My thoughts exactly," Draco muttered, but he seemed to relax a bit.

It may have seemed a little strange, but Harry was glad to have met someone who resented his fame as much as he did. So far, all anyone had to say about him was how amazing he was, when in truth, he didn't feel amazing at all.

The silence picked up again, with Draco still regarding Harry thoughtfully.

"Are all your family wizards?" Harry finally asked - eager to change the subject to something else.

Draco smirked at once and leaned comfortably in his seat.

"Yes, I come from a pureblood line of wizards. That really is the best type, but I'm sure you already know that. You'll find that some wizarding families are better than others. I'll help you with that." He held out a hand for Harry to shake. Harry considered this for a moment. He couldn't say he particularly liked Draco's superior attitude, but he seemed to be a more tolerable companion than one who might idolize Harry for his fame. He took Draco's hand and shook. Satisfied, Draco leaned back again.

"I heard you were raised by Muggles," said Draco. "I can't even imagine how horrible that must have been."

"Terrible – well, they're not all that bad. My aunt and uncle and cousin are though. Wish I'd been raised in a wizarding family."

"It certainly would beat what you had to live with. I'm an only child and my parents are always busy with important business. They invite other pureblood families to our manor for events, so I've seen loads of experienced witches and wizards. It can get boring, being shuttled around to parties all the time, but more often than not, I think it's an honor."

"I don't think I've been to a single party." Harry said - unless of course you count the one where he accidentally loosed a boa constrictor from the zoo on Dudley's birthday.

"Well then you must come to one of ours in the summer." Draco smiled widely. Harry was both pleased and alarmed by this invitation. He wasn't sure he'd be entirely comfortable at a large, and obviously wealthy, party. He put this from his mind for the time being.

While they had been talking, the train had carried them out of London. Now they were speeding past fields full of cows and sheep. They were quiet for a time, watching the fields and lanes flick past.

Around half past twelve there was a great clattering outside the corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman slid back their door and said, "Anything off the cart, dears?"

Harry, who hadn't had any breakfast, leapt to his feet and went into the corridor.

He had never had any money for candy with the Dursleys, and now that he had pockets rattling with gold and silver, he was ready to buy as many Mars Bars as he could carry – but the woman didn't have Mars Bars. What she did have were Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, Droobles Best Blowing Gum, Chocolate Frogs, Pumpkin Pasties, Cauldron Cakes, Licorice Wands, and a number of other strange things Harry had never seen in his life. Not wanting to miss anything, he got some of everything and paid the woman eleven silver Sickles and seven bronze Knuts.

Draco stared as Harry brought it all back into the compartment and tipped it onto an empty seat.

"Hungry?" Draco asked, bemused.

"Starving," said Harry, taking a large bite out of a pumpkin pasty. "Why didn't you get anything?" he asked Draco who had resumed his bored stare out the window.

"I don't eat any of that vile waste." He crinkled his nose when he said this.

"Not even chocolate?" Harry asked while identifying a chocolate frog.

"I try to avoid it, if I can." – but when he said this, he eyed one of Harry's chocolate frogs, curiously.

"Here, one chocolate frog couldn't hurt, could it?" Harry asked, holding out one for him.

Draco narrowed his eyes.

"I suppose just one… but, I have to give you something in exchange."

"No you don't. One chocolate frog, free of charge."

"Just a little bit of magic to even the balance," Draco said with a smirk. He pulled a wand out of his pocket. Harry leaned forward eagerly.

"You know magic?" he asked.

"My mother taught me a thing or two," Draco answered. He held his palm open and pointed at it with the wand. He mumbled something which Harry didn't catch, and a chocolate flower had formed in his hand. He held it out to Harry with a proud grin.

"Right now I can only make flowers," he said, "but its complex magic for something so simple. I can also tie shoe laces and stun small animals." He said these like they were astonishing feats which only the truest of wizards could accomplish. Nonetheless, Harry was impressed.

Draco gave in and shared a bit of Harry's candy stock and Harry asked him to teach him a spell or two with his own wand. It felt nice, having someone to share things with.

"Know what house you'll be put in yet?" Draco asked after a while.

"House?" Harry asked.

"Yes, you know, the four Hogwarts houses?" Draco raised an eyebrow as if this knowledge was elementary.

Harry shrugged.

"Well, I suppose being raised by filthy Muggles, you wouldn't really know much, would you?" Draco said.

"There are four houses at Hogwarts – Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. When the first-years get to school, they each get sorted into one of the houses. I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been – imagine being in Hufflepuff or Gryffindor, I think I'd leave," he drawled.

"What's wrong with Hufflepuff and Gryffindor?" Harry asked.

"Hufflepuffs are useless and Gryffindors. . . Well they're the natural enemy of Slytherins. Think they know everything, they do. Arrogant lot, really. With far too much pep, if you ask me."

"What about Slytherin?" Harry asked, "What are they like?"

"Many of the wealthiest and most famed witches and wizards came from Slytherin," Draco grinned proudly, "Like my own parents. But most people, these days, don't like Slytherins at all." There was a tinge of venom in his voice.

"Why not?" Harry asked.

"Well because Slytherin is the house where You-Know-Who came from," Draco answered.

Harry could see how this might frighten people away from the Slytherin house. He'd only been a part of the wizarding world for a day and already, at the mention of You-Know-Who, he felt a bit of fear creep through him.

"It's all nonsense, really. Slytherins aren't all that bad. And anyone who wants to achieve anything in life would be better of there anyway." Draco clearly felt strongly about this.

Harry wondered which house his own parents came from. He wished he would have had this conversation with Hagrid, who might have been able to tell him.

"Play Quidditch at all?" Draco asked after a moment.

"What's Quidditch?" Harry asked.

"Merlin's beard! You really don't know anything, do you?" Draco said, shocked. Harry was offended by this.

"Not like I can help it," Harry said, hotly.

"I didn't mean to sound rude," Draco said, though Harry somehow doubted this. "I've just never met anyone my age that wasn't raised in the purest of wizarding families. It's strange to meet someone who doesn't even know about Quidditch."

Harry accepted this explanation and asked about the game.

"It's our sport. The wizard sport," Draco explained. "It's played on a broomstick - Have you ever ridden a broomstick?"

"No," said Harry.

"Well, I'm rather good at it – Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my House, and I must say, I agree. I'd be more than happy to teach you a bit about flying once we're in school."

Harry was excited about this and listened as Draco began to explain the rules of Quidditch. He had only just described the four types of balls, however, when something crawled in through the partially opened compartment door.

It was a black and white cat with long fur and a rather long tail to match. As soon as it had squeezed through the entryway, it leapt onto one of the seats and dropped a fat toad beside Draco. It then mewled happily and began to lick its paw.

"What's this -" Draco started, but before he could finish, the door was slid open completely and a girl stepped inside. She checked behind her, nervously, and then turned back to the cat.

"Good boy, Camo," she praised before snatching up the toad and slipping it into her pocket. "If anyone asks, neither of you have seen a toad," she said to Draco and Harry. She had a whispery sort of voice, yellow hair, and very brown eyes that somewhat resembled those of the cat in their shape. Before Harry or Draco could respond to her, she had scooped up the black and white cat and left the compartment.

"Who was she?" Harry asked, at once.

"If I'm not mistaken," Draco said, "She was a Melbarke. They're another pureblood wizarding family. They used to be incredibly popular, or so my father has told me, but now days you don't hear much about them. In fact, I heard they were traveling for the past few years out of country. Father didn't expect she'd come to Hogwarts at all. I'll have to owl him about this."

Harry was just about to ask another question when the compartment door slid open yet again. This time there was a boy and a girl. The boy looked like he was on the verge of tears and the girl looked immensely agitated. She had a head of bushy brown hair and rather large front teeth.

"Have either of you seen a toad?" she asked. "Neville seems to have lost his."

Draco and Harry shared a look.

"No toad here," Draco said with narrowed eyes.

"Someone said that they saw a cat take it into this compartment. Are you sure you haven't seen it?" the girl prodded after Neville began to sob.

"Do you see a cat in here?" Draco snapped.

"Keep looking," Harry offered, politely. The girl narrowed her eyes and then dragged the boy out of the compartment with her.

Draco checked his watch and stood up.

"The train should be arriving soon. We should get changed into our robes."

Harry peered out the window. It was getting dark. He could see mountains and forests under a deep purple sky. The train did seem to be slowing down.

They were just taking off their jackets when the compartment door slid open yet again. Harry was beginning to get annoyed.

This time, there was another girl with a rather tight expression and brown hair. She smiled when she saw Draco.

"Pansy, get out of here!" Draco ordered, "Can't you see we're about to get changed?"

The girl's eyes widened at this and she shuffled her feet, shyly.

"I just wanted to check on you, Draco. And to tell you that we're almost to Hogwarts."

"Really?" Draco said, sarcastically, "I had no idea. Get out, Pansy - Unless you want to tell me how to button my clothes, too."

The girl seemed incredibly hurt by this. She sniffled and slammed the compartment shut on her way out.

"Pansy Parkinson," Draco said as they pulled on their long black robes. "I know I sounded harsh with her, but she's more of a drip than anyone I've ever met and she follows me around everywhere. I can only take so much, you know?"

A voice echoed through the train: "We will be reaching Hogwarts in five minute's time. Please leave your luggage on the train, it will be taken to the school separately."

Harry's stomach lurched with nerves and Draco, he saw, looked slightly paler than normal.

The train slowed right down and finally stopped. People pushed their way toward the door and out on to a tiny, dark platform. Harry shivered in the cold night air. Then a lamp came bobbing over the heads of the students, and Harry heard a familiar voice. "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! All right there, Harry?"

Hagrid's big hairy face beamed over the sea of heads.

"C'mon, follow me – any more firs' years? Mind yer step, now! Firs' years follow me!"

Slipping and stumbling, they followed Hagrid down what seemed to be a steep, narrow path. It was so dark on either side of them that Harry thought there must be thick trees there. Nobody spoke much. Neville, the boy who kept losing his toad, sniffed once or twice.

"Yeh'll get yer fis' sight o' Hogwarts in a sec," Hagrid called over his shoulder, "jus' round this bend here."

There was a loud "Ooooooh!"

The narrow path had opened suddenly onto the edge of a great black lake. Perched atop a high mountain on the other side, it windows sparkling in the starry sky, was a vast castle with many turrets and towers.

"No more'n four to a boat!" Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore. Harry and Draco were followed into their boat by Pansy and Goyle.

"Everyone in?" shouted Hagrid, who had a boat to himself. "Right then – FORWARD!"

And the fleet of little boats moved off all at once, gliding across the lake, which was as smooth as glass. Everyone was silent, staring up at the great castle overhead. It towered over them as they sailed nearer and nearer to the cliff on which it stood.

"Heads down!" yelled Hagrid as the first boats reached the cliff, they all bent their heads and the little boats carried them through a curtain of ivy that hid a wide opening in the cliff face. They were carried along a dark tunnel, which seemed to be taking them right underneath the castle, until they reached a kind of underground harbor, where they clambered out onto rocks and pebbles.

"Oy, you there? Is this your toad?" said Hagrid, who was checking the boats as people climbed out of them.

"Trevor!" cried Neville blissfully, holding out his hands. Only a few feet away from him, the Melbarke girl snickered to herself and hoisted her cat closer to her chest. Then they all clambered up a passageway in the rock after Hagrid's lamp, coming out at last onto smooth, damp grass right in the shadow of the castle.

They walked up a flight of stone steps and crowded around the huge, oak front door.

"Everyone here? You there, still got yer toad?"

Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.


	2. The Sorting Hat

(We've decided to be generous and put the second chapter up at once, for any eager beavers out there.)

The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood there. She had a very stern face and Harry's first thought was that this was not someone to cross.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

She pulled the door wide. The entrance hall was so big you could have fit the whole of the Dursley's house in it. The stone walls were lit with flaming torches like the ones at Gringotts, the ceiling was too high to make them out, and a magnificent marble staircase facing them led to the upper floors.

They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Harry could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right – but Professor McGonagall showed the first years into a small, empty chamber off the hall. They crowded in, standing rather closer together than they would usually have done, peering about nervously.

"Welcome to Hogwarts," said Professor McGonagall. "The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your Houses. The sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your House will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your House, sleep in your House dormitory, and spend free time in your House common room.

"The four Houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Each House has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your House points, while any rule-breaking will lose House points. At the end of the year, the House with the most points is awarded the House cup, a great honor. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever House becomes yours.

"The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school. I suggest you all smarten yourselves up as much as you can while you are waiting."

Her eyes lingered for a moment on Neville's cloak, which was fastened under his left ear. Harry nervously tried to flatten his hair.

"I shall return when we are ready for you," said Professor McGonagall. "Please wait quietly."

She left the chamber. Harry swallowed.

"How exactly do they sort us into Houses?" he asked Draco.

"An enchanted hat, Father says. I'm not quite sure how that works, though."

Harry had never been more nervous, never, not even when he'd had to take a school report home to the Dursleys saying that he'd somehow turned his teacher's wig blue. He kept his eyes fixed on the door. Any second now, Professor McGonagall would come back and lead him to his doom.

As if on cue, Professor McGonagall returned.

"Now, form a line," she told the first years, "and follow me."

Feeling oddly as though his legs had turned to lead, Harry got into line behind a boy with sandy hair, with Draco behind him, and they walked into the chamber, back across the hall, and through a pair of double doors into the Great Hall.

Harry had never imagined such a strange and splendid place. It was lit by thousands and thousands of candles that were floating in midair over four long tables, where the rest of the students were sitting. These tables were laid with glittering golden plates and goblets. At the top of the hall was another long table where the teachers were sitting. Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight. Mainly to avoid all the staring eyes, Harry looked upward and saw a velvety black ceiling dotted with stars. He heard someone whisper, "It's bewitched to look like the sky outside."

It was hard to believe there was a ceiling up there at all, and that the Great Hall didn't simply open up to the heavens.

Harry looked down again as Professor McGonagall silently placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years. On top of the stool she put a pointed wizard's hat. This hat was patched and frayed and extremely dirty. Aunt Petunia wouldn't have let it in the house.

For a few seconds, there was complete silence. Then the hat twitched. A rip near the brim opened wide like a mouth – and the hat began to sing:

"_Oh you may not think I'm pretty,_

_But don't judge on what you see, _

_I'll eat myself if you can find_

_A smarter hat than me._

_You can keep your bowlers black, _

_Your top hats sleek and tall,_

_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_

_And I can cap them all._

_There's nothing hidden in your head_

_The Sorting Hat can't see_

_So try me on and I will tell you_

_Where you ought to be._

_You might belong in Gryffindor,_

_Where dwell the brave at heart,_

_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_

_Set Gryffindors apart;_

_You might belong in Hufflepuff,_

_Where they are just and loyal, _

_Those patient Hufflepuff are true_

_And unafraid of toil;_

_Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_

_If you 've a ready mind,_

_Where those of wit and learning,_

_Will always find their kind;_

_Or perhaps in Slytherin_

_You'll make your real friends,_

_Those cunning folk use any means_

_To achieve their ends._

_So put me on! Don't be afraid!_

_And don't get in a flap!_

_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_

_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

The whole hall burst into applause as the hat finished its song. It bowed to each of the four tables and then became quite still again.

Harry didn't feel brave or quick-witted or any of it at the moment. If only the hat had mentioned a House for people who felt a bit queasy, that would have been the one for him.

Professor McGonagall now stepped forward holding a long roll of parchment.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted," she said. "Abbot Hannah!"

A pink-faced girl with blonde pigtails stumbled out of line, put on the hat, which fell right down over her eyes, and sat down. A moment's pause –

"HUFFLEPUFF!" shouted the hat.

One by one, the first years went up to get sorted. Susan Bones became a Hufflepuff, Terry Boot went into Ravenclaw with Mandy Brocklehurst. Lavender Brown became the first new Gryffindor and the table on the far left exploded with cheers; maybe it was just Harry's imagination, after what Draco had told him about Gryffindors, but they did seem a bit obnoxious.

He was starting to feel definitely sick now. He remembered being picked for teams during gym at his old school. He had always been last to be chosen, not because he was no good, but because no one wanted Dudley to think they liked him.

"Finch-Fletchy, Justin!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

Sometimes, Harry noticed, the hat shouted out the House at once, but at others it took a little while to decide. When it sorted Gregory Grayson into Ravenclaw, it needed only a moment, but when sorting Seamus Finnigan, the hat took almost a whole minute before it declared him a Gryffindor.

"Granger, Hermione!"

It was the bushy-haired girl from the train. She ran up and eagerly jammed the hat on her head.

"GRYFFINDOR!" shouted the hat.

A horrible thought struck Harry, as horrible thoughts always do when you're very nervous. What if he wasn't chosen at all? What if he just sat there with the hat over his eyes for ages, until Professor McGonagall jerked it off his head and said there had obviously been a mistake and he'd better get back on the train?

The boy who lost his toad got sorted into Gryffindor after a long while and then ran off still wearing the hat, and had to jog back amid gales of laughter to give it to "MacDougal, Morag."

Draco swaggered forward when his name was called and got his wish at once: the hat had barely touched his head when it screamed, "SLYTHERIN!"

Draco went to join Crabbe and Goyle at the Slytherin table, looking pleased with himself. He nodded at Harry before sitting down.

Next came "Melbarke, Malvora," the girl whose cat had stolen Neville's toad. She walked up with her cat, which Harry somehow thought should have been left on the train with everyone else's luggage, and sat on the stool in a dramatic fashion. The hat contemplated for a while with her and then roared, "SLYTHERIN!"

She showed no emotion except for a slight smirk as she joined the others at the Slytherin table, sitting by herself at the end.

There weren't many people left now.

"Moon". . ., "Nott" . . . , "Parkinson" . . . then a pair of twin girls, "Patil" and "Patil" . . . , then "Perks, Sally-Anne" . . ., and then at last –

"Potter, Harry!"

"_The_ Harry Potter?"

The last thing Harry saw before the hat dropped over his eyes was the hall full of people craning to get a good look at him. Next second he was looking at the black inside of the hat. He waited.

"Hmm," said a small voice in his ear. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind either. There's talent, oh my goodness, yes – and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting . . . So where shall I put you?"

Harry waited, unsure of what to think. What house did he _want _to be in?

"You're brave and noble, that's for sure. Not a bad match for Gryffindor. But, you have such talent. You could be great, you know, it's all here in your head. Slytherin will help you on your way to greatness, no doubt about that – "

Harry gripped the edges of the stool and thought, _Slytherin, I wouldn't mind Slytherin. _

"Slytherin, eh?" said the small voice. "Are you sure?"

Harry thought about how Voldemort had been in Slytherin House and how everyone disliked Slytherin's because of it. Harry did want to prove himself, more than anything, and show that Slytherin's weren't all that bad. Plus, Draco was in that House, and Harry considered him . . . well, an acquaintance, at least, which was more than could be said for anyone else he'd met so far.

"I see, I see. Well, if you're sure – better be SLYTHERIN!"

Harry heard the hat shout the last word to the whole hall. He took off the hat and walked shakily toward the Slytherin table. The Slytherins were all standing to clap for him, and some looked quite smug to have Harry Potter in their House. The Gryffindor table, on the other hand, did not look pleased in the least. Harry was glad for his choice. A Slytherin Prefect shook his hand, while Crabbe and Goyle cheered, "Potter! We got Potter!" Harry collapsed into the chair beside Draco, who looked the most pleased of everyone at the table.

Harry could see the High Table properly now. At the end farthest him sat Hagrid. And there, in the center of the High Table, in a large gold chair, sat Albus Dumbledore. Harry recognized him from a card he'd gotten in a chocolate frog on the train. He was the headmaster of Hogwarts. Dumbledore's silver hair was the only thing in the whole hall that shone as brightly as the ghosts that dotted the room. Harry spotted Professor Quirrell, too, the nervous young man from the Leaky Cauldron. He was looking very peculiar in a large purple turban.

The rest of the students were sorted, including a Rodchester to Ravenclaw, Thomas, Dean to Gryffindor, "Turpin, Lisa," to Ravenclaw, "Weasely, Ron" to Gryffindor, and "Zabini, Blaise," the last Slytherin.

Professor McGonagall rolled up her scroll and took the Sorting Hat away.

Harry looked down at his empty gold plate. He had only just realized how hungry he was. Pumpkin pasties and Chocolate Frogs seemed ages ago.

Albus Dumbledore had gotten to his feet. He was beaming at the students, his arms opened wide, as if nothing could have pleased him more than to see them all there.

"Welcome!" he said. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

He sat back down. Everybody clapped and cheered. Harry didn't know whether to laugh or not.

"Is he – a bit mad?" he asked Draco uncertainly.

"Mad?" said Draco, with a scoff, "Undoubtedly. My father thinks he's completely mental. One thing's for sure, though, he was a great wizard in his prime. Going to eat something?"

Harry's mouth fell open. The dishes in front of him were now piled with food. He had never seen so many things he liked to eat on one table: roast beef, roast chicken, pork chops and lamb chops, sausages, bacon and steak, boiled potatoes, roast potatoes, fries, Yorkshire pudding, peas, carrots, gravy, ketchup, and, for some strange reason, peppermint humbugs.

The Dursleys had never exactly starved harry, but he'd never been allowed to eat as much as he liked. Dudley had always taken anything that Harry really wanted, even if it made him sick. Harry piled his plate with a bit of everything except the peppermints and began to eat. It was all delicious.

It was only then that Harry realized he was sitting beside a ghost. He was a terrible sight, with blank staring eyes, a gaunt face, and robes stained with silver blood.

"That's the Bloody Baron," Draco whispered over his fork. "He's the Slytherin ghost. Doesn't say much from what I've heard, but can be nasty. I'd try to avoid him, if I were you."

Harry would be sure to take this advice to heart.

As the feast continued, the talk turned to their families.

"I'm pureblood, of course," Pansy was saying, her eyes darting to Draco.

Harry found quickly that most Slytherins were pure-blood, and those that weren't didn't say anything on the matter. Draco had no need to speak about his family- it was as if everyone already knew.

"What about you, Malvora?" Draco called across the table. "Is your family really pure-blood like they say?"

Malvora's cat was nowhere to be seen and Harry couldn't help but wonder if it was collecting scraps under the table. Malvora sat up straight to look at everyone with a hard expression.

"My family is pure," she said, slowly, "and even if they weren't, it wouldn't be any of your business, would it, Malfoy?" This was followed by several chuckles from the other students.

"If your family _is _pure," Draco said, undaunted, "then you should be proud."

"I don't really care," Malvora shrugged. "Pure-bloods, Muggles, there's not all that much of a difference anyway."

Draco looked severely offended by this. The table broke into laughter and Malvora resumed her guarded eating. Harry couldn't help but admire her attitude. He didn't understand why everyone cared so much about their family lineage. Harry wasn't even sure what his lineage was. His mother had been a witch, but his aunt was as Muggle as they come.

He was glad when the subject changed to classes.

Harry was starting to feel warm and sleepy and looked up to the High Table again. Hagrid was drinking deeply from his goblet. Professor McGonagall was talking to Professor Dumbledore. Professor Quirrell, in his absurd turban, was talking to a teacher with greasy black hair, a hooked nose, and sallow skin.

It happened very suddenly. The hook-nosed teacher looked past Quirrell's turban straight into Harry's eyes – and a sharp, hot pain shot across the scar on Harry's forehead.

"Ouch!" Harry clapped a hand to his head.

"What is it?" asked Draco.

"N-nothing."

The pain had gone as quickly as it had come. Harder to shake off was the feeling Harry had gotten from the teacher's look – a feeling that he didn't like Harry at all.

"Who's that teacher talking to Professor Quirrell?" he asked Draco.

"Who?" Draco looked up at the High Table. "Oh, that's Professor Snape. He's the head of the Slytherin House and the teacher of Potions. Everyone knows he wants to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts, though."

Harry watched Snape for a while, but Snape didn't look at him again.

At last, the desserts too disappeared, and Professor Dumbledore got to his feet again. The hall fell silent.

"Ahem – just a few more words now that we are all fed and watered. I have a few start-of-term notices to give you.

"First years should note that the forest on the grounds is forbidden to all pupils. I have also been asked by Mr. Filch, the caretaker, to remind you all that no magic should be used between classes in the corridors.

"Quidditch trials will be held in the second week of the term. Anyone interested in playing for their House teams should contact Madam Hooch.

"And finally, I must tell you that this year, the third-floor corridor on the right-hand side is out of bounds to everyone who does not wish to die a very painful death."

Harry laughed, but he was one of the few who did.

"He's not serious?" he muttered to Draco.

"Who knows?" said Draco, scowling. "He's a mad old coot, remember?"

"And now, before we go to bed, let us sing the school song!" cried Dumbledore. Harry noticed that the other teacher's smiles had become rather fixed.

Dumbledore gave his wand a little flick, as if he was trying to get a fly off the end, and a long golden ribbon flew out of it, which rose high above the tables and twisted itself, snakelike, into words.

"Everyone pick their favorite tune," said Dumbledore, "and off we go!"

And the school bellowed:

"_Hogwarts, Hogwarts, Hoggy Warty Hogwarts,_

_Teach us something please,_

_Whether we be old and bald_

_Or young with scabby knees,_

_Our heads could do with filling_

_With some interesting stuff,_

_For now they're bare and full of air,_

_Dead flies and bits of fluff,_

_So teach us things worth knowing, _

_Bring back what we've forgot, _

_Just do your best, and we'll do the rest_

_And learn until our brains all rot."_

Everybody finished the song at different times. At last, only a pair of Gryffindor twins were left singing along to a very slow funeral march. Dumbledore conducted their last few lines with his wand and when they had finished, he was one of those who clapped the loudest.

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here! And now, bedtime. Off you trot!"

The Slytherins followed a Prefect through the chattering crowds, out of the Great Hall, and down a flight of steps toward the dungeons. Harry's legs were like lead again, but only because he was so tired and full of food. He was too sleepy even to be surprised that the people in the portraits along the corridors whispered and pointed as they passed, or that they were being led through hidden doorways behind tapestries and sliding panels. They spiraled deeper and deeper down, and Harry was just wondering how much farther they had to go when they finally came to a stop.

They were in the dungeon. For a moment, Harry thought there had to be some kind of mistake, because the Slytherin Prefect was facing a rather blank stone wall.

"Surname," said the prefect, and all at once, the wall opened to reveal a passageway. They all walked into it and found themselves in the Slytherin common room, a grand - and somewhat cold – room with dark green and black furniture, much of which was leather. It was elegant, but dark, and one wall had great windows which looked out into the black lake, as the dungeon was beneath the lake.

The Prefect directed the girls through one door to their dormitory and the boys through another. At the bottom of yet another staircase – surely the very lowest chamber of the castle – they found their beds at last: lines of cots with black blankets. Their trunks had already been brought down. Too tired to talk much, they pulled on their pajamas and fell into bed.

"Amazing place, isn't it?" Draco said from the bed over. "Everything Father said was true."

Harry was going to comment, but he fell asleep at once.

Perhaps he had eaten a bit too much food, because he had a very strange dream. He was wearing Professor Quirrell's turban, which kept talking to him, telling him that he must transfer to Gryffindor because it was his destiny. Harry told the turban that he was happy in Slytherin; it got heavier and heavier; he tried to pull it off, but it tightened painfully – and there was Draco, trying to help him get it off, but all at once he turned into the hook-nosed teacher, Snape, who laughed at Harry while he struggled and his laugh became high and cold – there was a burst of green light and Harry woke, sweating and shaking.

He rolled over and fell asleep again, and when he woke the next day, he didn't remember the dream at all.


	3. The Potions Master

**Authors' Note: **A very good question has been brought up by a review: What is the purpose of writing a fic so canon? Well, our purpose, or better yet: our goal, is to re-write the entire Harry Potter series as if Harry had been sorted into Slytherin (a grand task yes, but not completely impossible). Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone sets the stage for the rest of the books, gives the rules and the basis for the series. Therefore, we wanted to incorporate the slightest changes into that story so that the effect of the other stories would be greater. Think of it like this, Harry getting sorted into Slytherin is the equivalent of throwing a snowball down the face of a snowy mountain: at first, the mountainside is entirely unaffected because, well it _is _only a snowball, but as it rolls and picks up snow and grows and grows, it eventually becomes an avalanche which wipes clean the entire mountain and completely changes the landscape. That is the idea of The Slytherin Tales. The first Tale will be more in sync with Rowling's books than any of the others, but imagine the magnified effects on the stories to come. We have already begun composing the Chamber of Secrets rendition, and it will be almost entirely seperate from Rowling's works because of the small alterations we've made in this tale. Harry can't very well pull the sword out of sorting hat if he's not a Gryffindor, can he?

In a nutshell: It is written like this to show how such a slight change can eventually change the entire series beyond recognition.

Yes, it can be tedious both reading and writing such a fic, but be assured, the parts where it is most like the original are predominant only in the first few chapters and, of course, the last chapter. The meat of this fic is considerably different from the original work, however, we don't blame you if you don't have the patience to read that far. By all means, wait until the sequel is created and read from there. Or don't read at all. ;)

Again, all criticisms are much appreciated, as well as all praises. *humble bow* Please enjoy Chapter 3.

* * *

"There, look."

"Where?"

"Next to Malfoy."

"Wearing the glasses?"

"Did you see his face?"

"Did you see his scar?"

Whispers followed Harry from the moment he left his dormitory the next day. People lining up outside classrooms stood on tiptoe to get a look at him, or doubled back to pass him in the corridors again, staring. Harry wished they wouldn't, because he was trying to concentrate on finding his way to classes.

There were a hundred and forty-two staircases as Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump. There were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also very hard to remember where anything was, because it all seemed to move around a lot. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Harry was sure the coats of armor could walk.

The ghosts didn't help, either. It was always a nasty shock when one of them glided suddenly through a door you were trying to open. Peeves the Poltergeist was worth two locked doors and a trick staircase if you met him when you were late for class. He would drop wastepaper baskets on your head, pull rugs from under your feet, pelt you with bits of chalk, or sneak up behind you, invisible, grab your nose, and screech, "GOT YOUR CONK!"

Even worse than Peeves, if that was possible, was the caretaker, Argus Filch. Harry and Draco managed to get on the wrong side of him on their very first morning. Filch found them trying to force their way through a door that unluckily turned out to be the entrance to the out-of-bounds corridor on the third floor. He wouldn't believe they were lost, was sure they were trying to break into it on purpose, and was threatening to lock them in the dungeons when they were rescued by Professor Quirrell, who was passing.

Filch owned a cat called Mrs. Norris, a scrawny, dust-colored creature with bulging, lamplike eyes just like Filch's. She patrolled the corridors alone. Break a rule in front of her, put just one toe out of line, and she'd whisk off for Filch, who'd appear, wheezing, two seconds later. Filch knew the secret passageways of the school better than anyone and could pop up as suddenly as any of the ghosts. The students all hated him, and it was the dearest ambition of many to give Mrs. Norris a good kick.

And then, once you had managed to find them, there were the classes themselves. There was a lot more to magic, as Harry quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words.

They had to study the night skies through their telescopes every Thursday at midnight and learn the names of different stars and the movements of the planets. Three times a week they went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, with a dumpy little witch called Professor Sprout, where they learned how to take care of all the strange plants and fungi, and found out what they were used for.

Easily the most boring class was History of Magic, which was the only one taught by a ghost. Professor Binns had been very old indeed when he had fallen asleep in front of the staff room fire and got up the next morning to teach, leaving his body behind him. Binns droned on and on while they scribbled down names and dates, and got Emeric the Evil and Uric the Oddball mixed up.

Professor Flitwick, the Charms teacher, was a tiny little wizard who had to stand on a pile of books to see over his desk. At the start of their first class he took the roll call, and when he reached Harry's name he gave an excited squeak and toppled out of sight.

Professor McGonagall was again different. Harry had been quite right to think she wasn't a teacher to cross. Strict and clever, she gave them a talking-to the moment they sat down in her first class.

"Transfiguration is some of the most complex and dangerous magic you will learn at Hogwarts," she said. "Anyone messing around in my class will leave and not come back. You have been warned."

Then she changed her desk into a pig and back again. They were all very impressed and couldn't wait to get started, but soon realized they weren't going to be changing the furniture into animals for a long time. After taking a lot of complicated notes, they were each given a match and started trying to turn it into a needle.

The class everyone had really been looking forward to was Defense Against the Dark Arts, but Quirrell's lessons turned out to be a bit of a joke. His classroom smelled strongly of garlic, which everyone said was to ward off a vampire he'd met in Romania and was afraid would be coming back to get him one of these days. His turban, he told them, had been given to him by an African prince as a thank-you for getting rid of a troublesome zombie, but they weren't sure they believe this story. For one thing, when asked how Quirrell had fought off the zombie, Quirrell went pink and started talking about the weather; for another, they had noticed that a funny smell hung around the turban, and that it probably was stuffed full of garlic as well, so that Quirrell was protected wherever he went.

Harry was very relieved to find out that he wasn't miles behind everyone else. There was so much to learn that even people like Draco didn't have much of a head start.

Friday, Harry and Draco went down to the Great Hall for breakfast.

"We have Double Potions today with the Gryffindors," said Draco. "Snape will favor us over them," he continued, smugly.

Just then, the mail arrived. Harry had gotten used to this by now, but it had given him a bit of a shock on the first morning when about a hundred owls had suddenly streamed into the Great Hall during breakfast, circling the tables until they saw their owner, and dropping letters and packages onto their laps.

Hedwig hadn't brought Harry anything so far. She sometimes flew in to nibble his ear and have a bit of toast before going off to sleep in the owlery with the other school owls. This morning, however, she fluttered down between the marmalade and the sugar bowl and dropped a note onto Harry's plate. Harry tore it open at once. It said, in a very untidy scrawl:

**Dear Harry, **

**I know you get Friday afternoons off, so would you like to come and have a cup of tea with me around three? I want to hear all about your first week. Send us an answer back with Hedwig. **

**Hagrid**

Harry borrowed Draco's quill, scribbled _Yes, please, see you later _on the back of the note, and sent Hedwig off again.

It was lucky that Harry had tea with Hagrid to look forward to, because the Potions lesson was among the worst things that had happened to him this week.

At the start-of-term banquet, Harry had gotten the idea that Professor Snape disliked him. By the end of the first Potions lesson, he knew this to be true.

Potions lessons took place down in one of the dungeons. It was colder here than up in the main castle, and would have been quite creepy enough without the pickled animals floating in glass jars all around the walls.

Snape, like Flitwick, started the class by taking the roll call, and like Flitwick, he paused at Harry's name.

"Ah, yes," he said softly, "Harry Potter_._"

He glanced up when he said Harry's name. His eyes were black like Hagrid's, but they had none of Hagrid's warmth. They were cold and empty and made you think of dark tunnels. He finished the roll and then began to speak.

"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making," he began. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word – like Professor McGonagall, Snape had the gift of keeping a class silent without effort. "As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses. . . I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death – if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."

More silence followed this little speech. Harry and Draco exchanged looks. Draco's expression showed that he approved of Professor Snape. Harry could not say the same.

"Potter!" said Snape, suddenly. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

_Powdered root of what to an infusion of what? _Harry glanced at Draco who avoided his eyes; the Gryffindor girl, Hermione Granger's hand shot up into the air.

"I don't know, sir," said Harry.

Snape's lip curled into a sneer and he ignored Hermione's hand.

"Let us try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

Hermione stretched her hand as high into the air as it would go without her leaving her seat, but Harry didn't have the faintest idea what a bezoar was.

"I don't know, sir."

"Clearly."

Harry forced himself to keep looking straight into those cold eyes. He hadlooked through his books at the Dursley's, but did Snape expect him to remember everything in _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi?_

Snape was still ignoring Hermione's quivering hand.

"What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

At this, Hermione stood up, her hand stretching toward the dungeon ceiling.

"I don't know," said Harry quietly. "I think you should ask her." He pointed at the bouncing Gryffindor girl.

A few people laughed; Harry caught Malvora's eye and she gave him a thumbs up. Snape, did not look incredibly pleased but, at this point, he turned his attention away from Harry.

"Asphodel and wormwood make a sleeping potion so powerful it is known as the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and it will save you from most poisons. As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant, which also goes by the name of aconite. Well? Why aren't you all copying that down?"

There was a sudden rummaging for quills and parchment. Over the noise, Snape said, "And I'd like to speak with you after class, Potter."

Snape put them all into pairs and set them to mixing up a simple potion to cure boils. He swept around in his long black cloak, watching them weigh dried nettles and crush snake fangs, criticizing almost everyone except Draco, whom he seemed to like. He was just telling everyone to look at the perfect way Draco had stewed his horned slugs when clouds of acid green smoke and a loud hissing filled the dungeon. Neville had somehow managed to melt another Gryffindor's cauldron into a twisted blob, and their potion was seeping across the stone floor, burning holes in people's shoes. Within seconds, the whole class was standing on their stools while Neville, who had been drenched in the potion when the cauldron collapsed, moaned in pain as angry red boils sprang up all over his arms and legs.

"Idiot boy!" snarled Snape, clearing the spilled potion away with one wave of his wand. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking the cauldron off the fire?"

Neville whimpered as boils started to pop all over his nose.

"Take him up to the hospital wing, "Snape spat at Neville's partner.

When potions ended, Harry told Draco he'd be outside in a minute, and he waited glumly for the other students to leave him with Snape. After the door shut behind the last student, Harry stood facing Snape, whose arms were folded and who seemed to be glaring rather cruelly at Harry.

"You are lucky to be in my House, Potter, or you would not have gotten away with your cheek so easily."

Harry looked at the ground.

"Sorry, sir," Harry mumbled, finding the situation extremely unfair.

"I would regret taking points away from my own House, so you would be wise to behave in my classroom, Potter. You might also consider reading the material you purchased for Potions at some point."

Harry almost argued with this, about to point out that he had read the book, but he thought better of it.

"Is that all, sir?" Harry asked, gloomily.

Snape sneered at him, as if about to say something more, but then turned.

"Yes," he drawled, "that is all, Potter."

Harry didn't waste his time leaving.

* * *

"What was that all about?" Draco asked later as they ascended from the dungeon.

"Snape says he'll take points away from Slytherin if I'm cheeky again," said Harry.

"Odd," Draco said, "it's unlike him to pick on Slytherins. What did you do, trip him down the stairs or something?"

"I didn't do anything!" Harry cried.

"Relax," Draco laughed, "you were probably just unlucky today. He likes me well enough," he stated, "he's bound to warm up to you, too."

Harry wasn't so sure, but didn't argue.

"I'm going to Hagrid's at three," he said.

"Why on earth would you want to see that beast of a man?" Draco gasped, sounding revolted.

Harry crossed his arms indignantly.

"Hagrid's a friend. I was going to invite you to come along, but if you'd rather play Wizard Chess with Crabbe and Goyle, that's fine." This was a very ironic thing to say, as Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle were not clever enough to play Wizard Chess. They were much better at games like, "trip the Gryffindor" or "beat each other senseless."

Draco thought about this for a moment.

"Father says that Hagrid was expelled from Hogwarts and I shouldn't be around him. There are also rumors that he's a half-giant. It can't be safe to be alone with a creature like that."

Harry had had enough of this argument and turned on his heels.

"I don't care what he is, he's my friend." He began to stride away in a huff.

"Wait a minute, Potter!" Draco called, running to catch up. "I'll go with you to the mongrel's house just this once. Only because I want to see what the attraction is."

"I don't care whether you come or not, but if you say another word about Hagrid. . ."

At five to three they left the castle and made their way across the grounds. Hagrid lived in a small wooden house on the edge of the forbidden forest. A crossbow and a pair of galoshes were outside the front door.

Draco muttered something incomprehensible and Harry knocked on the door. There was a frantic scrabbling from inside and several booming barks. Draco leapt at least five feet back from the door. Then Hagrid's voice ran out, saying, "_Back, _Fang – _back." _

Hagrid's big, hairy face appeared in the crack as he pulled the door open.

"Hang on," he said. "_Back, _Fang."

"I am not going in there with that… that thing," Draco hissed.

"Hagrid, maybe you should put – er, Fang, outside while we come inside," Harry offered.

"What?" Hagrid said as he held the door open with one hand and a great boarhound's collar with the other. "Fang's harmless. Come on now, can't hold 'im forever!"

With some convincing from Harry, Draco finally followed him inside. There was only one room. Hams and pheasants were hanging from the ceiling, a copper kettle was boiling on the open faire, and in the corner stood a massive bed with a patchwork quilt over it.

"Make yerselves at home," said Hagrid, letting go of Fang, who bounded straight at Draco and started licking his ears.

"GET THIS MUTT AWAY FROM ME!" Draco howled, attempting to get away. Hagrid was right, Fang was clearly harmless, but this wasn't Draco's concern. He was more worried about Fang ripping his robes or contaminating him than anything else.

"This is Draco," Harry told Hagrid, who had thrown a steak to the other side of the room for Fang to get occupied with.

"A Malfoy, eh?" said Hagrid, while boiling water into a large teapot and putting rock cakes onto a plate. "Forgot yeh got sorted into Slytherin, Harry." He said this with a tinge of disappointment, as though he had expected Harry to get sorted elsewhere.

"Where were my parents sorted, Hagrid?" Harry asked.

"Yer parents were Gryffindors, both of 'em. S'pose House isn't all that matters though. That's what Dumbledore always says, anyway."

Harry wondered again if he'd made the right choice when he picked his House. Finding out that his parents were in Gryffindor wasn't easy. He felt somehow like he was betraying them.

The rock cakes were shapeless lumps with raisins that almost broke Harry's teeth, but he pretended to be enjoying them – Draco refused to touch anything in Hagrid's hut, including the rock cakes – as they told Hagrid about their first lessons. Fang rested his head on Harry's knee and drooled all over his robes. Better there than near Draco, he supposed.

Harry and Draco were delighted to hear Hagrid call Filch "that old git."

"An' as fer that cat, Mrs. Norris, I'd like ter introduce her to Fang sometime. D'yeh know, every time I go up ter the school, she follows me everywhere? Can't get rid of her."

"Sounds like Pansy," Draco commented under his breath. Harry laughed. Draco stood still by the door the whole time they were in Hagrid's hut, but he eventually stopped nervously watching Fang and began to regard Hagrid with judging eyes.

Harry told Hagrid about Snape's lesson. Hagrid told Harry not to worry about it, that Snape liked hardly any of the students, after which Draco proudly declared that Snape was favorable to him, which received him annoyed looks from both Harry and Hagrid.

"But Snape doesn't pick on Slytherins," Harry protested. "He must really _hate _me."

"Rubbish!" said Hagrid. "Why should he?"

Yet Harry couldn't help thinking that Hagrid didn't quite meet his eyes when he said that.

"How's yer parents?" Hagrid asked Draco. "Haven't heard much about Lucius Malfoy in a while. Didn' like 'im much when he went to Hogwarts."

Harry wondered if Hagrid had changed the subject on purpose. While Draco eagerly boasted about all of his father's recent accomplishments, Harry picked up a piece of paper that was lying on the table under the tea cozy. It was a cutting from the _Daily Prophet: _

**GRINGOTTS BREAK-IN LATEST**

Investigations continue into the break-in at

Gringotts on 31 July, widely believe to be the

work of Dark wizards or witches unknown.

Gringotts goblins today insisted that nothing

had been taken. The vault that was searched had in

fact been emptied the same day.

"But we're not telling you what was in there, so

keep your noses out if you know what's good

for you," said a Gringotts spokesgoblin this after-

noon.

"Hagrid!" said Harry, "that Gringotts break-in happened on my birthday! It might've been happening while we were there!"

There was no doubt about it, Hagrid definitely didn't meet Harry's eyes this time. He grunted and offered him another rock cake. Harry read the story again. _The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied earlier that same day. _Hagrid had emptied vault seven hundred and thirteen, if you could call it emptying, taking out that grubby little package. Had that been what the thieves were looking for?

As Harry and Draco walked back to the castle for dinner, Harry thought that none of the lessons so far had given him as much to think about as tea with Hagrid. Had Hagrid collected the package just in time? Where was it now? And did Hagrid know something about Snape he didn't want to tell Harry?


	4. Midnight Meeting

Harry had thought that Draco was exaggerating about Gryffindor behavior, but as time went by, Harry was beginning to find that he really didn't like them at all. Sure, Slytherin had done their fair share of damage to Gryffindor pride – having won the house cup each year for the past six years, along with flattening the Gryffindors in Quidditch the year before – but it hardly seemed a good reason for all the hard feelings. Harry had hoped to stay out of the squabble between the two Houses, but upon having numerous pranks pulled on him by the Weasely twins, along with getting yelled at by Lavender Brown when he accidentally bumped into her in the hall, he was starting to dislike the House as a whole.

Still, first-year Slytherins only had Potions with the Gryffindors, so they didn't have to put up with the petty arguments as much. Or at least, they didn't until they spotted a notice pinned up in the Slytherin common room that made them all sneer. Flying lessons would be starting on Thursday – and Gryffindor and Slytherin would be learning together.

"Typical," said Harry darkly. "Just what I always wanted. To make a fool of myself on a broomstick in front of the Gryffindors."

He had been looking forward to learning to fly more than anything else.

"Don't make me laugh," said Draco. "Most of them have never even touched a broomstick, let alone ridden one. Just watch me and you'll pick up flying easy."

Draco talked about flying a lot. He complained loudly about first years never getting on the House Quidditch teams and told long, boastful stories that always seemed to end with him narrowly escaping Muggles in helicopters. Harry was beginning to wonder if it wasn't all just talk. Draco wasn't the only one, though: Blaise Zabini said he'd crashed into a window after chasing down a remote controlled airplane when he was only five. Even Milicent Bulstrode said she'd been riding a broom since she was two. Everyone from wizarding families talked about Quidditch constantly.

Malvora had never been on a broomstick because she said she preferred dragons. Not that she'd ever ridden a dragon, she was just convinced that they would be much more entertaining.

Pansy had ridden a broomstick once and it had messed up her hair, so she hadn't ridden one since. Crabbe and Goyle had both ridden broomsticks as well, though it was a particularly difficult task for them because of their size and all of their stories seemed to end in the broomstick breaking.

Harry had had enough of the Quidditch talk and was very relieved by the arrival of the mail at breakfast on Thursday.

Harry hadn't had a single letter since Hagrid's note, whereas Draco seemed to receive one every day with packages of sweets from home. He didn't mind sharing with Harry, since he was sure his parents would just send more the next day. In fact, Draco's eagle owl simply began to show up with two packages of sweets, one which was intended for Harry. Though Harry was uncomfortable with this at first, it did seem to work out for the best, since Draco couldn't hog all the good candies for himself – and he assured Harry that it was no bother to his parents to spoil them both in order to keep their son happy.

At the Gryffindor table, a barn owl brought Neville a small package. Harry and Draco were on their way out of the Great Hall and passed the table just in time to hear Neville say, "It's a Remembrall! Gran knows I forget things – this tells you if there's something you've forgotten to do. Look, you hold it tight like this and if it turns red – oh…" his face fell, because the Remembrall had suddenly glowed scarlet, "… you've forgotten something…"

Draco nudged Harry in the ribs and smirked. Before Harry had a chance to even guess what he was up to, he'd snatched the Remembrall out of Neville's hand. The youngest Weasely stood up immediately.

"Drop it, Draco," Harry warned. He didn't want to be involved in one of these fights.

"What's going on?" It was Professor McGonagall.

"Malfoy's got my Remembrall, Professor."

Scowling, Draco quickly dropped the Remembrall back on the table.

"Just looking," he said, and he sloped away with Harry behind him.

"Sorry," Harry apologized quickly to Neville as he walked by. "Why'd you do a thing like that?" he snapped at Draco as soon as they were out of hearing distance.

"For a laugh, of course," said Draco. "That Longbottom has the brain of a gnome." Draco was quite impressed by his own humor, for he laughed boisterously after saying this.

"It wasn't funny," Harry said eyes narrowed.

"It was just a joke," Draco shot back. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you were siding with a Gryffindor."

"I'm not siding with anyone!" shouted Harry. "I don't think you should pick fights with them, especially with someone as defenseless as Neville."

Draco could hardly believe someone was standing up to him as boldly as this.

"Just what's your problem, Potter?"

"At the moment, you are!" Harry spat.

A silence followed. Draco's face was twisted into a perplexed sneer and Harry was glaring back at him, fiercely. It was Draco who finally turned his gaze away.

"You've got some nerve, Potter," he said in a low voice, "Fine. I'll leave Longbottom alone, but this doesn't mean I'm soft or I like any of those Gryffindors, got it?"

"I don't care if you hate every one of them," said Harry, "Just don't go around picking on people like Neville."

The conversation was dropped there.

At three-thirty that afternoon, Harry, Draco, and the other Slytherins hurried down the front steps onto the grounds for their first flying lesson. It was a clear, breezy day, and the grass rippled under their feet as they marched down the sloping lawns toward a smooth, flat lawn on the opposite side of the grounds to the forbidden forest, whose trees were swaying darkly in the distance.

The Gryffindors arrived shortly, and so did their teacher, Madam Hooch. She had short, gray hair, and yellow eyes like a hawk.

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" she barked. "Everyone stand by a broomstick. Come on, hurry up."

Harry glanced down at his broom. It was old and some of the twigs stuck out at odd angles.

"Stick out your right hand over your broom," called Madam Hooch at the front, "and say 'Up!'"

"UP!" everyone shouted.

Harry's broom jumped into his hand at once, but it was one of the few that did. Pansy's broom sort of flopped, Hermione Granger's broom simply rolled over, and Malvora's hadn't moved at all. Perhaps brooms, like horses, could tell when you were afraid, thought Harry; there was a quaver in Neville's voice that said only too clearly that he wanted to keep his feet on the ground.

Madam Hooch then showed them how to mount their brooms without sliding off the end, and walked up and down the rows correcting their grips. Draco was quite shocked to hear that he'd been doing it wrong for years.

"Now, when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard," said Madam Hooch. "Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet, and then come straight back down by leaning forward slightly. On my whistle – three – two"

But Neville, nervous and jumpy and frightened of being left on the ground, pushed off hard before the whistle had touched Madam Hooch's lips.

"Come back, boy!" she shouted, but Neville was rising straight up like a cork shot out of a bottle – twelve feet – twenty feet. Harry saw his scared white face look down at the ground falling away, saw him gasp, slip sideways off the broom and –

WHAM – a thud and a nasty crack and Neville lay facedown on the grass in a heap. His broomstick was still rising higher and higher, and started to drift lazily toward the forbidden forest and out of sight.

Madam Hooch was bending over Neville, her face as white as his.

"Broken wrist," Harry heard her mutter. "Come on, boy – it's all right, up you get."

She turned to the rest of the class.

"None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch.' Come on, dear."

Neville, his face tear-streaked, clutching his wrist, hobbled off with Madam Hooch, who had her arm around him.

Draco made a face, as if he wanted badly to make fun of Neville, but he looked at Harry and saved his breath. Then, an excited and mischievous expression filled his face. He got onto his broomstick.

"Well then, Harry," said Draco, "I promised I'd teach you a thing or two about flying, didn't I?"

Harry looked around, uncertainly. They had been told, and rather directly, not to touch their brooms.

"What's wrong, afraid are you?" Draco's broom hovered into the air. "Don't want to accept the challenge?"

"Go on, Harry," called Malvora. "Race him!"

The other Slytherins joined in immediately. Everyone was always ready to see a good showdown. They seemed rather intent on watching the two of them race.

Harry thought about it for a moment more, and then mounted his broomstick.

"_No!"_ shouted Hermione Granger. "Madam Hooch told us not to move – you'll get us all in trouble."

Harry ignored her. He kicked hard against the ground and up, up he soared; air brushed through his hair, and his robes whipped out behind him – and in a rush of fierce joy he realized he'd found something he could do without being taught – this was easy, this was _wonderful. _He pulled his broomstick up a little to take it even higher, and heard screams and gasps of girls back on the ground.

He turned his broomstick sharply to face Draco, who looked stunned.

"Don't just sit there," Harry called, "I thought we were going to race."

Draco grinned and, without warning, shot past Harry like a javelin. Harry turned and leaned forward and grasped the broom tightly in both hands and went straight after him. Draco glanced behind him and looked worried to see Harry closing the space between them. He dived down, unexpectedly and changed direction. He hadn't been lying, he _could _fly well.

"Malfoy!" Goyle called as Draco and Harry sped toward them. "Look what I found!"

It was Neville's Remembrall. It must have fallen when he was flying. Goyle threw it hard into the air toward Draco, who darted to take hold of it. He hovered on his broomstick for a moment, staring at the glittering ball.

"Let's up the stakes, eh, Potter?" asked Draco, holding the ball out.

"Put it down, Draco," Harry said, "You'll break it."

"See if you can catch me, then!" He took off again, faster than before.

Harry flew as fast as he could, desperate to prove himself and to get the Remembrall from Draco. He was catching up fast and was almost close enough to touch the hem of Draco's robes when the young Malfoy turned to look behind him. He clearly hadn't been expecting Harry to be so close, for he slipped and in his struggle to grasp the broomstick again, he dropped the Remembrall.

Harry saw, as though in slow motion, the ball start to fall. He leaned forward and pointed his broom handle down – next second he was gathering speed in a steep dive, racing the ball – wind whistled in his ears, mingled with the screams of people watching – he stretched out his hand – a foot from the ground he caught it, just in time to pull his broom straight, and he toppled gently onto the grass with the Remembrall.

"HARRY POTTER!"

His heart sank faster than he'd just dived. Professor McGonagall was running toward them. He got to his feet, trembling.

"_Never_ – in all my time at Hogwarts – "

Professor McGonagall was almost speechless with shock, and her glasses flashed furiously, " – how _dare _you – might have broken your neck – Potter, follow me, now."

Harry almost argued that Draco had started it, but decided against it. He walked numbly in Professor McGonagall's wake as she strode toward the castle. He was going to be expelled, he just knew it. He wanted to say something to defend himself, but there seemed to be something wrong with his voice. Professor McGonagall was sweeping along without even looking at him; he had to jog to keep up. Now he'd done it. He hadn't even lasted two weeks. He'd be packing his bags in ten minutes. What would the Dursleys say when he turned up on the doorstep?

Up the front steps, and down a staircase she went. She wrenched open doors and marched along corridors with Harry trotting miserably behind her. He suddenly realized, with a sense of impending doom, where she was taking him.

Professor McGonagall stopped outside of Snape's classroom. She opened the door and poked her head inside.

"Excuse me, Professor Snape, but could I borrow you and Marcus Flint for a moment?"

Harry had no idea what was going on, but he knew that Snape would not be pleased to see him.

Professor Snape walked out with a tall, dark-haired Slytherin boy. Snape already looked irritated to have been interrupted in class, but when he saw Harry, his irritation turned quickly into something more venomous.

"Professor McGonagall," he seethed, "what's the occasion?"

"Potter disobeyed the rules in Madam Hooch's class and very nearly got himself killed," Professor McGonagall said. "I thought, as head of his House, you should be the one to decide on his punishment."

Great. Thought Harry. He'd be expelled for sure.

"But before you make your final decision, I would like to put in another word. That is why I had you bring Flint out."

Harry had no idea what was going on, but the feeling was returning to his legs.

"Was that your first time on a broomstick, Potter?"

Harry nodded silently.

"He caught a Remembrall at a fifty-foot dive," Professor McGonagall told Snape. "Didn't even scratch himself. Charlie Weasely couldn't have done it."

Snape narrowed his eyes.

"And your point being?" he said.

"My point being, before you decide to punish Potter, you might consider him for your Quidditch team. Of course, it would be Flint's final say, but it is something for you to think about as well, Professor Snape."

Marcus Flint seemed to be sizing Harry up.

"He's got a Seeker's build," said Flint, walking around Harry and staring at him. "If he's as good as she says, we could use him. Wouldn't want to drop our winning streak to Gryffindor this year."

"Indeed," Professor McGonagall said through narrowed eyes. "If that is all, then my business here is done." She turned and left as quickly as she had come.

Snape was very still.

"We do not typically allow first-years on the Quidditch teams, Potter," he said. "And there is still the matter of your punishment."

"Professor," Marcus Flint interrupted, "with all due respect, I wouldn't mind taking Potter out for a test run myself. I could see how he works with the balls. And if he's that good-"

"Yes, I understand," Snape snapped. He rounded on Harry at once, his eyes accusing. "Potter, if you are not the best Seeker that Slytherin has ever seen, I will be sure to do more than take ten points from you, be sure of that. If you are not capable of keeping up your classwork and training, I will snatch you down from your broomstick and pile on you enough detention to make the Weasely twins cringe. And there will be no more disobedience to your teachers as long as you are in my House, do you understand, Potter?"

Harry could hardly believe all that had just happened, let alone speak. Instead, he nodded.

Snape didn't say another word. He swooped around, robes billowing, and returned to his classroom, slamming the door behind him.

"So where did the old bat take you?"

It was dinnertime. Harry had just met up with Draco, whose first move was of course to ask about what had happened when he'd left the grounds with Professor McGonagall.

Harry didn't say anything for a moment. He knew Draco wouldn't be happy to hear about Harry making it onto the Quidditch team, especially when Draco was so set on being on the team himself. It was all he ever seemed to talk about.

"She took me straight to Snape," said Harry evasively.

"That's not so bad," Draco said. "What did he do?"

"He took ten points from Slytherin."

"That's nothing for how McGonagall dragged you out of the field," said Draco. "She made a big deal of it and you only lost ten points? No detention?"

Harry swallowed a large chunk of pie.

"Well, no," he said, slowly, "but she wanted to talk to Marcus Flint as well…" He knew this was going to end badly.

"Marcus Flint?" asked Draco. "The Quidditch captain? But why would she want to speak to him?" Draco's eyes narrowed with suspicion.

"Apparently," said Harry, "she was really impressed by my flying and she suggested that Snape let Flint put me on the team – as Seeker."

Draco's expression was unreadable.

"And did he?" he asked, quietly. "Did Snape let Flint put you on the team?"

Harry looked down and gave a brief nod. A long silence followed.

"I'm sorry, Draco," said Harry. "I had no idea-"

"Oh, I'm sure, Potter!" Draco snapped. "You just hated being told that you were going to be Seeker, didn't you? You know, _I _was the one that got you into the air! You'd never even touched a broomstick!" A few Slytherins were beginning to look.

"Draco, I'm sure if McGonagall had seen you," Harry pleaded, "she would have done the same-"

"But she didn't see me, did she?" he seethed. "She was too busy looking at the famous Harry Potter."

"It's not like that at all!" Harry shouted. Now the Slytherins weren't the only ones watching.

"You just love all the attention, don't you, Potter? Can't go a day without someone noticing you. As selfish as they come."

"Look who's being selfish!"

Harry felt that this entire argument was extremely unfair. Draco hadn't even taken a moment to be happy for Harry's achievement – instead he'd changed the subject right back to himself.

What happened next was very fast. Harry stood up – not to fight, but to walk away – but this action was interpreted differently by Crabbe and Goyle, who stood up immediately at Draco's defense. Before Harry had the time to respond, Professor Snape loomed over all of them, glaring.

"Just what do you think you're doing, Potter?" he snapped.

Harry glared at Draco as hard as he could.

"Leaving," said Harry.

To his great relief, Snape did not pursue him as he left the Great Hall.

It had certainly not been a perfect day, Harry thought, as he lay awake much later, listening to Crabbe snore. Earlier, when he was in the common room, he'd seen Malvora and Draco whispering to each other near the fireplace. He'd also gotten curious – sometimes angry – looks from other classmates. He had been very ready to go to sleep, but was simply too fed up to doze off. He kept on thinking about Draco's sneering face, just one bed over; combined with Crabbe's snores, it was nearly driving him mad.

At last, just when he seemed to be drifting off, he heard someone get out of bed. Harry listened carefully and tried to make out the figure in the dark. It was definitely Draco.

Unable to contain his curiosity, Harry waited until Draco was out of the room, and silently slipped out of bed to follow him.

Up, Harry went, and into the common room. The fire was out and the only light came from the moonlight that filtered into the lake outside the windows. Harry waited at the top of the stairs to see if he could make out Draco in the dark. He caught a glimpse of him just in time to see him leave the passageway into the dungeon corridors.

Harry paused before following him. There was a very good chance he was going to get caught by Filch or Mrs. Norris, and he felt like he was pushing his luck, breaking another school rule today. On the other hand, he couldn't stop thinking about his argument with Draco, and who knew what he might be up to, roaming the castle at night.

He followed Draco as he flitted along corridors striped with bars of moonlight from the high windows. At every turn Harry expected to see him run into Filch or Mrs. Norris, but they were lucky. Draco was climbing the levels of the castle and sped up a staircase to the third floor, where the trophy room was.

Luckily, Draco didn't close the door all the way, and Harry was able to listen through the crack, though he was worried about standing in the open corridor. Filch could show up at any second.

"-Of course I'm sure," a voice whispered. It sounded like Malvora.

"What makes you think it will work?" Draco's voice responded, heavy with skepticism.

"Just shut up and trust me," Malvora snapped. "You want to get on the team, don't you? You want to show up Potter?"

A moment of silence.

"Let's hear it then," said Draco.

Harry leaned closer to the door.

"Quidditch try-outs are in two days," said Malvora. "All you have to do is try-out-"

"First years aren't allowed on the teams," Draco interrupted, "unless it's Potter, of course."

"That's why you charm Flint before you try out."

Harry thought he heard something down the hall. He jerked to look, but there was nothing. With his nerves even more jittery, he listened again to the door.

"I know a charm," said Malvora, "called _Inspiratum Motivus_. It makes whoever you cast it at be inspired by you. It only works on people, trolls, ogres and giants and it could work anywhere from two minutes to two hours, but it's the best I have."

"That's rather unreliable, wouldn't you say?"

"If you've got something better, knock yourself out."

More silence.

"Teach me the charm," said Draco.

"Not so fast," Malvora hissed. "I want something in return."

"Another catch," Draco groaned.

Malvora whispered something and Harry struggled to hear what she was saying. He pushed the door open, just a little bit more…

"You're mad!" Draco accused. "Can't your parents get you something like that?"

"No," Malvora said simply. "Do we have a deal?"

Silence.

"Fine," Draco spat.

Harry tried to move back from the door as quickly as possible, knowing that whatever business Malvora and Draco had conducted was over. As he stepped back, however, he heard a low meow from near his feet. It was Malvora's cat.

"Sh," said Malvora, "someone's here."

The door was flung open and Harry fell forward. He picked himself up and faced Draco and Malvora.

"Well, well, Potter," Draco hissed, "eavesdropping?"

Before Harry could respond, he heard someone speak.

"What's wrong, my sweet? Smell children lurking about?"

It was Filch speaking to Mrs. Norris. Horror-struck, Harry waved madly at the other two to follow him as quickly as possible; they scurried silently down hall, away from Filch's voice. Draco's robes had barely whipped round the corner when they heard Filch enter the trophy room.

"This way!" Harry mouthed to the others and, petrified, they began to creep down a long gallery full of suits of armor. They could hear Filch getting nearer. Malvora's cat, Camo, suddenly leaped onto one of the suits of armor. Malvora lunged to grab him, but tripped, toppling the suit right over.

The clanging and crashing were enough to wake the whole castle.

"RUN!" Harry yelled, and the three of them sprinted down the gallery, not looking back to see whether Filch was following – they swung around the doorpost and galloped down one corridor then another, Harry in the lead, without any idea where they were or where they were going – they ripped through a tapestry and found themselves in a hidden passageway, hurtled along it and came out near their Charms classroom, which they knew was miles from the trophy room.

"Your stupid cat could have gotten us killed!" Draco panted, pointing at Malvora.

"He's not stupid!" she gasped, clutching the cat so hard against her chest that his ribs might break.

"We've got to get back to the dungeons," said Harry, "quickly."

"What makes you think we'll go with you, Potter?" Draco challenged. "I'll find my own way back."

"Splitting up isn't a bad idea," said Malvora. "At least that way, if one of us gets caught, the other two don't."

"That's that," said Draco, who turned in the other direction.

It wasn't going to be that simple. He hadn't gone more than three paces when a doorknob rattled and something came shooting out of a classroom in front of him.

It was peeves. He caught sight of the three of them and gave a squeal of delight.

"Shut up, Peeves – please – you'll get us thrown out."

Peeves cackled.

"Wandering around at midnight, Ickle Firsties? Tut, tut, tut. Naughty, naughty, you'll get caughty."

"Not if you don't give us away, Peeves, please."

"Should tell Filch, I should," said Peeves in a saintly voice, but his eyes glittered wickedly. "It's for your own good, you know."

"RUN!" Malvora called.

"STUDENTS OUT OF BED!" Peeves bellowed, "STUDENTS OUT OF BED DOWN THE CHARMS CORRIDOR!"

Ducking under Peeves, they ran for their lives, right to the end of the corridor where they slammed into a door – and it was locked.

"I knew I shouldn't have followed you, Potter!" Draco cried, as they pushed helplessly at the door. "I won't be able to explain this one to Father!"

They could hear footsteps, Filch running as fast as he could toward Peeve's shouts.

"Shut up," Malvora hissed. She jammed something into the keyhole and wiggled it.

The lock clicked and the door swung open – they piled through it, shut it quickly, and pressed their ears against it, listening.

"Which way did they go, Peeves?" Filch was saying. "Quick, tell me."

"Say 'please.'"

"Don't mess with me, Peeves, now _where did they go?" _

"Shan't say nothing if you don't say please," said Peeves in his annoying singsong voice.

"All right – _please_."

"NOTHING! Ha haaa! Told you I wouldn't say nothing if you didn't say please! Ha ha! Haaaaa!" And they heard the sound of Peeves whooshing away and Filch cursing in rage.

"He thinks this door is locked," Harry whispered. "I think we'll be okay."

"Think again."

"What?"

Harry turned around – and saw, quite clearly, what. For a moment, he was sure he'd walked into a nightmare – this was too much, on top of everything that had happened so far.

They weren't in a room, as he had supposed. They were in a corridor. The forbidden corridor on the third floor. And now they knew why it was forbidden.

They were looking straight into the eyes of a monstrous dog, a dog that filled the whole space between ceiling and floor. It had three heads. Three pairs of rolling, mad eyes; three noses, twitching and quivering in their direction; three drooling mouths, saliva hanging in slippery ropes from yellowish fangs.

It was standing quite still, all six eyes staring at them, and Harry knew the only reason they weren't already dead was that their sudden appearance had taken it by surprise, but it was quickly getting over that, there was no mistaking what those thunderous growls meant.

Harry groped for the doorknob – between Filch and death, he'd take Filch.

They fell backward – Harry slammed the door shut, and they ran, they almost flew, back down the corridor. Filch must have hurried off to look for them somewhere else, because they didn't see him anywhere, but they hardly cared – all they wanted to do was put as much space as possible between them and that monster. They didn't stop running until they reached the stone wall that hid the Slytherin common room in the dungeons.

"Tooth and nail!" panted Harry, and the wall opened. They scrambled into the common room and collapsed, trembling, onto the couches.

It was a while before any of them said anything.

"It can't be _legal _to keep that thing in a school," said Draco, who was shaking the most. "When my father hears about this –"

"He won't hear about it," Harry snapped. "Do you expect him to be happy that you were running around the castle at night?"

Draco glared at Harry and didn't say anything. Harry was busy trying to figure out why on earth the monster was in the school to begin with.

"Stunning," Malvora whispered.

"What do you mean, stunning?" Draco snarled, terror still in his eyes.

"It had remarkable claws, like that of the Styxian dragon," she said, thoughtfully.

"Why on earth were you staring at its claws?"

"To get a better look at the trapdoor," she said simply.

She stood up, still holding her cat, which, Harry noticed, was quite still.

"Don't worry about him. I used a sleeping spell after the trophy room – And, Malfoy, I'll teach you that charm later." With these words, she vanished into the girl dormitories.

"Are you going to tell on me if I charm Marcus Flint?" Draco asked after watching Malvora walk away.

"No," Harry sighed, "I don't really care."

At the moment, it couldn't have been truer. Malvora had given Harry something else to think about as he climbed back into bed. There was a trapdoor, which meant the dog was guarding something… What had Hagrid said? Gringotts was the safest place in the world for something you wanted to hide – except perhaps Hogwarts.

It looked as though Harry had found out where the grubby little package from vault seven hundred and thirteen was.


	5. Halloween

**Author's Note: **In regards to Harry and Draco's relationship: Although Draco has taken Ron's role in the three-friend dynamic, his relationship with Harry is not the same as Harry's relationship with Ron. Draco and Harry's friendship is plagued with much more anger and rivalry than Harry and Ron's. We have made the best attempts to keep the characters personalities the same as they were originally, which means that of course, Draco will constantly be jealous of Harry and Harry will constantly be annoyed by Draco. However, some unavoidable alterations will take place. Harry, for example, has no tolerance for Draco teasing the innocent, which means that Draco will become a more tame character than in the original, and he will develop a grudging respect for Harry as his best friend. The point is, Draco will not become Ron (we can't stand that guy either). He will become a more rounded character than in the original work, and he will be best friends with Harry, but in a very different sense than Harry's friendship with Ron.

And no fluff. ;) Harry and Draco are purely friends, but they will have sweet moments after huge arguments where their care for each other is more defined. Think of the Goblet of Fire, when Harry and Ron fought and eventually made up. That's what Harry and Draco's relationship is like... all the time.

As for Malvora (the oc): She is not nearly as intelligent as Hermione, but what she lacks in book smarts, she makes up for in street smarts. Ex. Hermione uses Alohomora on a door : Malvora picks the lock. Ex. Hermione gets a book from the library : Malvora steals a book from someone's bag. They can essentially accomplish the same tasks, but using different approaches. This chapter will give a better image of that.

* * *

Draco and Harry didn't argue the next day. Meeting the three-headed dog seemed to be enough to keep the tensions at bay. Draco liked to pretend that he was far less frightened by the dog than he really was, and quite enjoyed talking about the sort of trouble Dumbledore would get in if the Ministry of Magic knew about what lurked in one of Hogwarts corridors. Harry filled Draco in about the package that seemed to have been moved from Gringotts to Hogwarts, and they spent a lot of time wondering what could possibly need such heavy protection.

"It's likely a very powerful dark artifact," said Draco, as if he knew a lot about dark artifacts.

But all they knew for sure about the mysterious object was that it was about two inches long, they didn't have much chance of guessing what it was without further clues.

Malvora hadn't talked to Harry or Draco since the incident, but this wasn't unusual. Slytherins didn't spend too much time together, typically – especially not someone like Malvora, who was much more interested in sketching drawings of the three-headed dog than actually talking about it.

About a week went by and the three headed dog fell into the back of their minds and Quidditch was brought right into the front when they saw a notice posted in the Slytherin common room after breakfast, declaring the Quidditch team try outs. There were three slots open. Two for Chasers and one for a Beater, but not for a Seeker.

Harry didn't say anything to Draco about it, fearing another argument.

"I've got to be a Chaser, at least," is all Draco muttered.

"Potter!" a voice called. It was Marcus Flint, who was passing through the common room on his way out to the Quidditch field. "Why don't you come with me and I can test you out before I close your position permanently?"

Harry looked at Draco, who was carefully avoiding his eyes, and then nodded.

They left the castle and set off toward the Quidditch field. He'd never been inside the stadium before. Hundreds of seats were raised in stands around the field so that the spectators were high enough to see what was going on. At either end of the field were three golden poles with hoops on the end. They reminded Harry of the little plastic sticks Muffle children blew bubbles through, except that they were fifty feet high.

Marcus Flint carried a large wooden crate under one arm and a broomstick under the other.

"We don't have much time," he said, "so I'll go through this quickly.

"Quidditch is easy to understand. Seven players on each side, fourteen total. Three of the seven are Chasers."

"Three Chasers," Harry repeated, as Flint took out a bright red ball about the size of a soccer ball.

"This is the Quaffle," said Flint. "The Chasers try to get points by throwing the ball through the hoop. Each goal is worth ten points, got it?"

"The Chasers throw the Quaffle and put it through the hoops to score," Harry recited. "So – that's sort of like basketball on broomsticks with six hoops, isn't it?"

"Basketball?" Flint said with an eyebrow raised.

"Never mind," said Harry quickly.

"Then, there're the Keepers. One for each side. They try to keep the other team from scoring."

"Three Chasers, one Keeper," said Harry, who was determined to remember it all. "And they play with the Quaffle. Okay, got that. So what are they for?" He pointed at the three balls left inside the box.

In response, Flint handed Harry a small club, a bit like a short baseball bat.

"Bludgers," said Flint.

He showed Harry two identical balls, jet black and slightly smaller than the red Quaffle. Harry noticed that they seemed to be straining to escape the straps holding them inside the box.

"Be ready," Flint said. He bent down and freed one of the Bludgers.

At once, the black ball rose high in the air and then pelted straight at Harry's face. Harry swung at it with the bat to stop it from breaking his nose, and sent it zigzagging away into the air – it zoomed around their heads and then shot at Flint, who jumped on it and pinned it to the ground.

He forced the struggling Bludger back into the crate and strapped it safely.

"Bludgers try to knock players off their brooms. So we have two Beaters on each team to protect their side from the Bludgers and try to knock them toward the other team. Got it?"

"Three Chasers try and score with the Quaffle; the Keeper guards the goal posts; the Beaters keep the Bludgers away from their team," Harry reeled off.

Flint nodded.

"Er – have the Bludgers ever killed anyone?" Harry asked, hoping he sounded offhand.

"Not here. Mostly broken bones. Now the last member of the team is the Seeker, who doesn't have to worry about the Quaffle or Bludgers–"

" – Unless they crack my head open."

"The Beaters will take care of that."

Flint reached into the crate and took out the fourth and last ball. Compared with the Quaffle and the Bludgers, it was tiny, about the size of a large walnut. It was bright gold and had little fluttering silver wings.

"This is the Golden Snitch. It's fast and difficult to see, but it's also what the whole game depends on. It's your job to catch it. You've got to be faster than not only the Snitch, but the Beaters and the Bludgers, and you have to be able to weave in between everyone else. You want to get it before the other team's Seeker because whichever Seeker catches the Snitch wins his team an extra hundred and fifty points. On top of that, a game of Quidditch only ends when the Snitch is caught. The longest game on record is three months, they had to keep bringing on substitutes so the players could get some sleep.

"And that's the game of Quidditch."

Harry nodded. He understood what he had to do all right, it was doing it that was going to be the problem.

"Now let's test out your flying."

He put the Snitch away and pulled a bag of ordinary golf balls out of his pocket and a few minutes later, he and Harry were up in the air, Flint throwing the golf balls as hard as he could in every direction for Harry to catch.

Harry didn't miss a single one, and Flint approved. After half an hour, he finally landed.

"We'll be sure to win the Cup again this year," Flint grinned, "as long as the try outs aren't a total flop." He scowled and checked his watch. "Speaking of which, it's almost time."

"Could I stay and watch?" Harry asked.

"Don't see why not," said Flint.

Harry waited in the stands for the try outs to begin. A handful of people showed up to try out and a few other spectators, as well. Malvora, Pansy, Crabbe and Goyle were among them. Malvora came to sit beside Harry, and they watched as the competitors were suited up. Draco was there, and when he stood with the six other competitors, he looked incredibly tiny.

"He wants to show you up pretty badly," Malvora commented.

And boast about it, thought Harry.

"Did you show him the charm?" asked Harry.

"Yes," she said, "but he owes me."

Adrian Pucey was trying out to be a Chaser and was currently being timed on how quickly he could throw the Quaffle through the three hoops.

"If you don't mind my asking," said Harry, "what does he owe you?"

"A coat made from the feathers of an Athenan Dragon," she replied, in the matter-of-fact way in which she spoke.

A fur coat didn't seem like too much to ask, so Harry assumed it must be extremely valuable. Before he had a chance to ask, though, Draco was called to try out next. Harry watched closely, as Draco reached into a crate to grab a broomstick. He was hunched over for quite some time. To spectators, this may have looked like he was trying to pick out a broom really carefully, but Harry knew better.

At last, Draco stood up, broom in hand.

"When I say go," Flint called, "I want you to throw this Quaffle into a hoop, catch it, then repeat through both remaining hoops. After that, you will playing against the Keeper, got it?"

Draco nodded, a slight smirk on his face.

"GO DRACO!" Pansy shouted from lower in the stands.

"Wooh, Malfoy!" Crabbe yelled.

Draco mounted his broomstick and Flint threw him the Quaffle. He caught it and prepared to kick off the ground.

"GO!" yelled Flint.

Draco was rather skilled on a broom. He chucked the Quaffle through the farthest hoop and darted down toward the ground to catch it as it fell. As soon as he'd caught it, he swooped around to throw it into the second hoop.

"Good!" Flint said, eyes wide. "Amazing style!"

With this confidence boost, Draco sped up even more, capturing the Quaffle again and throwing it into the final hoop.

"Outstanding!" Flint called, as Draco caught the Quaffle for the last time and landed. "One minute, twenty. Slower than Pucey, but your turns were sharp enough to outfly any Keeper!"

"Good job, Draco!" screamed Pansy.

Next, Draco had to score against the Keeper. Flint played this role for now.

Draco lost the Quaffle twice to Flint, and made three goals. This was the same score as Mourag, the third person trying out for Chaser.

"No way he'll let him on the team," said Harry. "Mourag and Pucey were faster. Draco's good, but not that good."

"Sh, just watch," Malvora chided.

Flint and Draco landed and almost as soon as Draco's broom had touched the ground, Flint was patting him on the back.

"First years aren't usually allowed on the team," he said, "but there's something about you that makes me think we'll do great this season, even with such young ones. On top of that, it will just give you and Potter more experience, won't it? Truly inspiring, Malfoy. You're on."

Pansy nearly toppled out of her seat when she heard this. Crabbe and Goyle high-five each other, and Malvora smirked. Harry could hardly believe it. Maybe Draco would stop trying to outdo him now.

"Potter, Malfoy," Flint called as Harry and Draco met up to walk back to the castle, "Let's destroy Gryffindor this year."

Perhaps it was because he was now so busy, what with Quidditch practice three evenings a week on top of all his homework, but Harry could hardly believe it when he realized that he'd already been at Hogwarts two months. The castle felt more like home than Privet Drive ever had. His lessons, too, were becoming more and more interesting now that they had mastered the basics.

On Halloween morning they woke to the delicious smell of baking pumpkin wafting through the corridors. Even better, Professor Flitwick announced in Charms that he thought they were ready to start making objects fly, something they had all been dying to try since they'd seen him make a quill zoom around the classroom. Professor Flitwick put the class into pairs to practice. Harry's partner was Blaise Zabini. Draco was to be working with Malvora Melbarke, which was unfortunate considering that two months had gone by and Draco had still not paid her for teaching him the charm that got him on the Quidditch team.

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!" squeaked Professor Flitwick, perched on top of his pile of books as usual. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important, too – never forget Wizard Baruffio who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest."

It was very difficult. Harry and Blaise swished and flicked, but the feather they were supposed to be sending skyward just lay on the desktop. Blaise got so impatient that he jabbed the feather with his wand and it disintegrated.

At the next table, Draco and Malvora hadn't even lifted their wands.

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to get something like that?" Draco was saying, his feather untouched.

"Your parents have the money, don't they?" Malvora asked.

"Of course they do, but I'm not mental enough to ask them for something like that!" said Draco. "Don't your parents have the money?"

"Of course they do, but my parents refuse to spoil me like yours!" she shot back at him. The force of her voice caused her feather to waft off the table. It went unnoticed.

"Miss Melbarke, Mister Malfoy, I do hope you're at least attempting the spell," Flitwick said, distracting them from their argument, temporarily.

"_Wingardium Leviosa!" _they said, at exactly the same time. The feather didn't move.

"If these were Athenan feathers, they would float that much easier," Malvora snapped.

"Would you be quiet about that stupid coat!" shouted Draco, slamming his wand on the table. Sparks shot out the end, directly at Malvora. Her clothes caught fire immediately.

There were a few seconds of panic and students watched as Flitwick doused Malvora in water. She looked twice as uncomfortable after the fire was put out and she was sopping wet. In a huff, she turned and stormed from the classroom – not before giving Draco a rather angry look.

Draco was in a very bad mood by the end of the class.

"She's bonkers if she really thinks I'll get her that coat," he said to Harry as they pushed their way into the crowded corridor.

"You did make a deal with her," Harry pointed out.

"What's she going to do?" Draco sneered. "Set her cat on me?"

Malvora didn't turn up for the next class and wasn't seen all afternoon. Draco didn't say anything about it, but was particularly irritable for the rest of the day. On their way down to the Great Hall for the Halloween feast, Harry and Draco saw Malvora's cat – stalking in the corridor – and no Malvora, but a moment later they had entered the Great Hall, where the Halloween decorations put her out of their minds.

A thousand live bats fluttered from the walls and ceiling while a thousand more swooped over the tables in low black clouds, making the candles in the pumpkins stutter. The feast appeared suddenly on the golden plates, as it had at the start-of-term banquet.

Harry was just helping himself to a baked potato when Professor Quirrell came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone stared as he reached Professor Dumbledore's chair, slumped against the table, and gasped, "Troll – in the dungeons – thought you ought to know."

He then sank to the floor in a dead faint.

There was an uproar. It took several purple firecrackers exploding from the end of Professor Dumbledore's wand to bring silence.

"Prefects," he rumbled, "lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately!"

Timothy Orthos, a Slytherin prefect, immediately took action.

"Come on, then! Follow me, stick close together! Get out of the way!"

"How could a troll get in?" Harry asked as they climbed the stairs.

"Same way the three-headed dog got in, I imagine," said Draco with a scowl.

They passed different groups of people hurrying in different directions. As they jostled their way through a crowd of confused Hufflepuffs, Harry suddenly grabbed Draco's arm.

"I've just thought – Malvora."

"What about her?"

"She doesn't know about the troll."

Draco yanked his arm away from Harry.

"So, what then?" he asked. "You want to play hero and go save her?"

"Draco, she could be in real trouble!" Harry snapped, not believing what was being said.

"Well then, you go and be all noble," said Draco. "As for me, I'm not about to get killed by a troll."

"And what about Malvora? You'll just let her get killed then? It would be your fault, you know," Harry accused, "If you had just gotten her the coat, like you said, she'd be here now!"

Draco paused. He obviously hadn't thought about someone dying on his account.

"Fine," he snapped, paler than usual.

Ducking down, they joined the Hufflepuffs going the other way, slipped down a deserted side corridor, and hurried off toward the dungeons. They had just turned the corner when they heard quick footsteps behind them.

"The troll!" Draco cried, darting behind a large stone griffin.

Harry followed and peered around it. Who they saw was not a troll, however, but Snape. He crossed the corridor and disappeared from view.

"What's he doing?" Harry whispered. "Why isn't he down in the dungeons with the rest of the teachers?"

"What does it matter? Let's just get back to the common room –"

Before he could finish, Harry was creeping along the corridor after Snape's fading footsteps.

"He's heading for the third floor," Harry said.

"Eugh, do you smell that?" Draco groaned. "I've never smelled anything so foul."

Harry sniffed and the disgusting stench reached his nostrils. A mixture of old socks and the kind of public toilet no one seems to clean.

And then they heard it – a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of gigantic feet. Draco whimpered and pointed – at the end of a passage to the left, something huge was moving toward them.

Draco darted for the nearest room. Harry followed closely after and shut the door as quickly – and quietly – as he could behind him. They were inside of a girl's bathroom and, to their surprise, laying in the corner of the wall opposite, beneath the sinks, was Malvora.

"It's killed her!" Draco squeaked. "The troll killed her and it's all my fault! I should have just gotten her the coat!" He looked near tears.

"Draco, calm down," said Harry, walking over to her. "She's not dead, she's just –"

Malvora rubbed her eyes and sat up with a yawn.

" – asleep."

Draco slumped against the wall in relief.

"Hmm?" Malvora yawned. "Oy, what are you doing in the girl's bathroom?"

The answer came in the form of a loud crash as the troll smashed the door open. Draco clutched the wall, pale as the Bloody Baron, and Malvora jumped to her feet. The troll was entering.

It was a horrible sight. Twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite gray, its great lumpy body like a boulder with its small bald head perched on top like a coconut. It had short legs thick as tree trunks with flat, horny feet. The smell coming from it was incredible. It was holding a huge wooden club, which dragged along the floor because its arms were so long.

Its ears twitched and it began to advance on them. They had nowhere to run and Draco began to wail. The troll's ears twitched again and it turned to lumber toward Draco's cries.

"Confuse it!" Harry said desperately, and, seizing a tap, he threw it as hard as he could against the wall.

The troll stopped and looked around, blinking stupidly, to see what had made the noise. Its mean little eyes saw Harry. It hesitated, then made for him instead, lifting its club as it went. Malvora ducked past it and stood behind it, her arms flailing.

"Over here!" she yelled. The troll paused again, turning it's ugly snout toward her instead, giving Harry time to run around it.

"Come on, Draco!" Harry yelled, trying to pull Draco toward the door, but he couldn't move, he was still flat against the wall, lips quivering in terror.

The shouting and the echoes seemed to be driving the troll berserk. It roared again and started toward Malvora, who was nearest.

Harry then did something that was both very brave and very stupid: He took a great running jump and managed to fasten his arms around the troll's neck from behind. The troll couldn't feel Harry banging there, but even a troll will notice if you stick a long bit of wood up its nose, and Harry's wand had still been in his hand when he'd jumped – it had gone straight up one of the trolls nostrils.

Howling with pain, the troll twisted and flailed its club, with Harry clinging on for dear life; any second, the troll was going to rip him off or catch him a terrible blow with the club.

Draco had sunk to the floor in fright; Malvora pulled out her own wand – not knowing what she was going to do she heard herself cry out the first spell that came into her head: "_Wingardium Leviosa!"_

The club flew suddenly out of the troll's hand, rose high, high up into the air, turned slowly over – and dropped, with a sickening crack, onto its owner's head. The troll swayed on the spot and then fell flat on its face, with a thud that made the whole room tremble.

Harry got to his feet. He was shaking and out of breath. Malvora had dropped her wand and was now gaping at what she had done.

"Y-you killed it." Draco whispered.

"I don't think so," said Harry, "I think it's just been knocked out."

He bent down and pulled his wand out of the troll's nose. It was covered in what looked like lumpy gray glue.

"Urgh – troll boogers."

He wiped it on the troll's trousers.

A sudden slamming and loud footsteps made the three of them look up. They hadn't realized what a racket they had been making, but of course, someone downstairs must have heard the crashes and the troll's roars. A moment later, Professor McGonagall had come bursting into the room, closely followed by Snape, with Quirrell bringing up the rear. Quirrell took one look at the troll, let out a faint whimper, and sat quickly down on a toilet, clutching his heart.

Snape bent over the troll. Professor McGonagall was looking at Harry and Draco. Harry had never seen her look so angry. Her lips were white.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" said Professor McGonagall, with cold fury in her voice. Harry looked over at Draco, who was still slumped against the wall. "You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

Snape gave Harry a swift, piercing look.

"A fair question," he said.

"Well you can't have expected us all to get to the dormitories in this chaos!" Malvora suddenly said. "With everyone running round, it's no wonder we got lost! It's not like we were out looking for a giant troll!"

Harry and Draco both looked at her.

"You'd think we'd get some thanks for killing it!" she said, rather cheekily. "Harry stuck his wand up its nose and I knocked it out with its own club. And Draco – well he was a good enough distraction for it.

"Miss Melbarke, hold your tongue!" Professor McGonagall snapped. "Ten points from Slytherin for that – "

"I believe, Minerva," Snape intervened, "that I can hand out punishment to my students, alone." He looked at the three of them, expressionlessly. "Though, most of what occurred here appears to be dumb luck, it takes some brains to fight a mountain troll. Fifteen points to Slytherin. I will inform Professor Dumbledore of this. Now leave."

They hurried out of the chamber and didn't speak at all until they reached the common room. Draco was very silent, but it was no wonder why. After all, he had sat against a wall and cried while his best friend and a girl fought a mountain troll.

They had reached the secret Slytherin wall.

"Tooth and Nail," said Harry and they entered.

The common room was packed and noisy. Everyone was eating the food that had been sent down. Malvora, however, stood at the end of the passageway, her cat in her arms.

"Don't worry," she said quietly, "I won't tell everyone that you scream like a girl." She looked at Draco with a slight smile. Draco hung his head, scowling.

"Malvora –" Harry started.

"Mal," she corrected. "Call me Mal."

There was a very embarrassed pause. Then, they all looked up at each other and hurried off to get plates.

But from that moment on, Malvora Melbarke became their friend. There are some things you can't share without ending up liking each other, and knocking out a twelve-foot mountain troll is one of them.


	6. Quidditch

As they entered November, the weather turned very cold. The mountains around the school became icy gray and the lake like chilled steel. Every morning the ground was covered in frost. Hagrid could be seen from the upstairs windows defrosting broomsticks on the Quidditch field, bundled up in a long moleskin overcoat, rabbit fur gloves, and enormous beaverskin boots.

The Quidditch season had begun. On Saturday, Harry and Draco would be playing their first match after weeks of training: Slytherin versus Gryffindor. If Gryffindor won, they would move up into second place in the House Championship.

Hardly anyone had seen Harry play because Flint had decided that, as their secret weapon, Harry should be kept, well, secret. But the news that he was playing Seeker of course leaked out, and Harry didn't know which was worse – people telling him he'd be brilliant or people telling him they'd be running around underneath him holding a mattress.

It was really lucky now that Harry had Malvora as a friend. She was sneaky and clever enough to know all the shortcuts to the homework assignments, and Harry didn't know how he would have survived without her, what with all the last-minute Quidditch practice Flint was making them do. She had also stolen _Quidditch Through the Ages _for Harry from the school library, which turned out to be a very interesting read.

Harry learned that there were seven hundred ways of committing a Quidditch foul and that all of them had happened during a World Cup match in 1473; that Seekers were usually the smallest and fastest players, and that most serious Quidditch accidents seemed to happen to them; that although people rarely died playing Quidditch, referees had been known to vanish and turn up months later in the Sahara Desert.

Malvora had become a bit more relaxed around Draco since the affair with the mountain troll, since now she felt she had leverage against him if he continued to refuse to get her the Athenan fur coat. Whenever he opened his mouth to complain, she would mockingly mention how he cried like a little girl while she saved him from the troll and threaten to tell the whole House about it. Other than this, they all seemed to get along rather well.

The day before the first Quidditch match, the three of them were out in the freezing courtyard during break, and Malvora had conjured them up a bright blue fire. They were standing with their backs to it, getting warm, when Snape crossed the yard. Harry noticed at once that Snape was limping. Harry, Draco, and Malvora moved closer together to block the fire from view; they were sure it wouldn't be allowed. Snape eyed them, but limped right past and they got away lucky.

The Slytherin common room was very noisy that evening. Harry, Draco, and Malvora sat next to each other by the window facing the lake. Malvora was showing Draco a pen that would automatically correct his mistakes on his Charms homework, but warning that she would only let him borrow it if he brushed Camo for a week.

Harry felt restless. Seeing Snape today had really bothered him, and he couldn't focus on relaxing about tomorrow when Snape's limp was all he could think about. Harry didn't trust him. Well, he didn't really trust anyone. It was practically a law of being Slytherin. If someone was acting suspicious, it was because they were up to something. Getting up, he told Draco and Malvora he was going out for a walk to clear his head.

Harry knew that sneaking was not the best idea, but he thought that if he could at least _see _Snape, once more, he might get a clue about his leg.

He made his way down to the staffroom and knocked. There was no answer. He knocked again. Nothing.

Well, if there was no one inside, then taking a quick look wouldn't bother anyone. He pushed the door ajar and peered inside – and a horrible scene met his eyes.

Snape and Filch were inside, alone. Snape was holding his robes above his knees. One of his legs was bloody and mangled. Filch was handing Snape bandages.

"Blasted thing," Snape was saying. "How are you supposed to keep your eyes on all three heads at once?"

Harry tried to shut the door quietly, but –

"POTTER!"

Snape's face was twisted with fury as he dropped his robes quickly to hide his leg. Harry gulped.

"Professor, I was just going to ask –"

"GET OUT! _OUT_!"

Harry left, before Snape could punish him. He sprinted back downstairs.

"Quick walk," Malvora said as Harry joined them. "What's wrong?"

In a low whisper, Harry told them what he'd seen.

"You know what this means?" he finished breathlessly. "He tried to get past the three-headed dog at Halloween! That's where he was going when we saw him – he's after whatever it's guarding! And I'd bet that _he _let the troll in, to make a diversion!"

Mal's eyes were narrowed in concentration.

"That makes sense," she said, "but why? Why would Snape try to steal something Dumbledore's keeping safe?"

"I swear, you two are mad," said Draco. "If Snape really is trying to steal something from Hogwarts, it's for a good reason."

"How can you know that for sure?" asked Harry.

"I'm with Harry," Mal said. "I wouldn't put anything past Snape. The real question is: what's the dog guarding?"

Harry went to bed with his head buzzing with the same question. Crabbe was snoring loudly, but Harry couldn't sleep. He tried to empty his mind – he needed to sleep, he had to, he had his first Quidditch match in a few hours – but the expression on Snape's face when Harry had seen his leg wasn't easy to forget.

* * *

The next morning dawned very bright and cold. The Great Hall was full of the delicious smell of fried sausages and the cheerful chatter of everyone looking forward to a good Quidditch match.

Harry hadn't touched his breakfast. He felt terrible. In an hour's time, he'd be walking onto the field. Draco didn't look well either. His face was paler than normal and he was sort of just prodding at his bacon.

The mail came as usual. As the owls flooded into the Great Hall, everyone's attention was caught at once by two long, thin packages carried by twelve large screech owls. Harry was just as interested as everyone else to see what was in these large parcels, and was amazed when the owls soared down and dropped them right in front of him and Draco, knocking plates to the floor. They had hardly fluttered out of the way when another owl dropped a letter in front of Draco, who ripped the letter open and held it out for Harry to read.

_Dear Draco,_

_We are very proud that you've made it onto the Quidditch team. The parcels contain Nimbus Two Thousands for yourself and Harry Potter. Continue to impress us._

_With love,_

_Mother and Father_

Harry had difficulty hiding his glee as he and Draco tore into their parcels. Many eyes were staring at them, enviously.

"I knew I could bully Father into buying us brooms, but Nimbus Two Thousands?" Draco grinned widely, proud to have the very best parents of everyone in the room.

Even Harry, who knew nothing about the different brooms, thought they looked wonderful. Sleek and shiny, with mahogany handles and long tails of neat, straight twigs and Nimbus Two Thousand written in gold near the tops.

"Oy, why do Malfoy and Potter get broomsticks?" called out a red-haired Gryffindor boy.

"Because we're on the Quidditch team, Weasely," Draco snapped back, not hiding his joy. "Come on, Harry, let's get out to the field."

The nervous feeling in Harry's stomach had quelled a little.

By eleven o' clock the whole school seemed to be out in the stands around the Quidditch pitch. Many students had binoculars. The seats might be raised high in the air, but it was still difficult to see what was going on sometimes.

Malvora joined Pansy, Crabbe and Goyle in the top row. As a nice surprise to Harry and the team, the Slytherin spectators were all wearing pins that showed a snake choking a lion in support of their team. A few even had flags that shimmered green and flashed, "We hope you choke" in silver letters.

Meanwhile, in the locker room, Harry, Draco and the rest of the team were changing into their green Quidditch robes (Gryffindor would be playing in scarlet).

"All right, shut it and listen!" Flint called for silence.

"We have four new members to the team, but that's no excuse for us to lose," he said. "I expect you all to play as hard as you can and to get us points at any cost, got it?"

Everyone nodded.

"You'd better prove that you belong on this team," he threatened, eyes dark. "Don't lose. Now, come on! Let's watch Gryffindor choke!"

Harry gave Draco a brief nod and followed the team members out of the locker room and, hoping his knees weren't going to give way, walked onto the field to loud cheers.

Madam Hooch was refereeing. She stood in the middle of the field waiting for the two teams, her broom in her hand.

"Now, I want a nice fair game, all of you," she said, once they were all gathered around her. Harry noticed that she seemed to be speaking particularly to their captain, Marcus Flint. Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw a fluttering flag high above, flashing _We hope you choke _over the crowd. His heart skipped. He felt braver.

"Mount your brooms, please."

Harry clambered onto his Nimbus Two Thousand.

Madam Hooch gave a loud blast on her silver whistle.

Fifteen brooms rose up, high, high, into the air. They were off.

"And the Quaffle is taken immediately by Angelina Johnson of Gryffindor – what an excellent Chaser that girl is, and rather attractive, too –"

"JORDAN!"

"Sorry, Professor."

A Gryffindor, Lee Jordan, was doing the commentary for the match, closely watched by Professor McGonagall.

"And she's really belting along up there, a neat pass to Alicia Spinnet, a good find of Oliver Wood's, last year only a reserve – back to Johnson and – no, the Slytherins have taken the Quaffle, some first year whose name I can't remember throws the ball to Slytherin Captain Marcus Flint and off he goes – Flint flying like an eagle up there – he's going to sc – no, stopped by an excellent move by Gryffindor Keeper Wood and the Gryffindors take the Quaffle – that's Chaser Katie Bell of Gryffindor there, nice dive around Flint, off up the field and – OUCH – that must have hurt, hit in the back of the head by a Bludger – Quaffle taken by the Slytherins – that's Adrian Pucey speeding off toward the goal posts, but he's blocked by a second Bludger – sent his way by Fred or George Weasley, can't tell which – nice play by the Gryffindor Beater, anyway, and Johnson goes – she's really flying – dodges a speeding Bludger – the goal posts are ahead – come on, now, Angelina – Keeper Bletchley dives – misses – GRYFFINDORS SCORE!"

Gryffindor cheers filled the cold air, with howls and moans from the Slytherins.

Way up above, Harry was gliding over the game, squinting about for some sign of the Snitch. This was part of the game plan.

When Angelina had scored, Harry had done a couple of loop-the-loops to let off his feelings. Now he was back to staring around for the Snitch. Once he caught sight of a flash of gold, but it was just a reflection from one of the Weasley twin's wristwatches, and once a Bludger decided to come pelting his way, more like a cannonball than anything, but Harry dodged it and Terrence Higgs came chasing after it.

"Slytherin in possession," Lee Jordan was saying, "Chaser Pucey ducks two bludgers, two Weasleys, and Chaser Bell, and speeds toward the – wait a moment – was that the Snitch?"

A murmur ran through the crowd as Pucey dropped the Quaffle, too busy looking over his shoulder at the flash of gold that had passed his left ear.

Harry saw it. In a great rush of excitement, he dived downward after the streak of gold. Gryffindor Seeker Ophelia Hart had seen it, too. Neck and neck they hurtled toward the Snitch – all the Chasers seemed to have forgotten what they were supposed to be doing as they hung in midair to watch.

Harry was faster than Hart – he could see the little round ball, wings fluttering, darting up ahead – he put on an extra spurt of speed –

WHAM! A roar of rage echoed from the Gryffindors below – Flint had blocked Hart on purpose and she spun off course, holding on for dear life.

"Foul!" screamed the Gryffindors.

Madam Hooch spoke angrily to Flint and then ordered a free shot at the goal posts for Gryffindor. But in all the confusion, of course, the Golden Snitch had disappeared from sight again.

Down in the stands, the Slytherins were complaining loudly.

"They can't prove that Flint did that on purpose!" Pansy was yelling.

"But Flint should have been sneakier," said Mal. "You don't just throw yourself at someone and expect to get away with it."

"Why don't you join the team, if you know so much about it," Pansy snapped at her.

"I already said that I don't like brooms," Mal rolled her eyes. "Don't be so stupid."

Lee Jordan was finding it difficult not to take sides.

"So – after that obvious and disgusting bit of cheating –"

"Jordan!" growled Professor McGonagall.

"I mean, after that open and revolting foul –"

"_Jordan, I'm warning you_ –"

"All right, all right. Flint nearly kills the Gryffindor Seeker, which could happen to anyone, I'm sure, so a penalty to Gryffindor, taken by Spinnet, who puts it away, no trouble, and we continue play, Gryffindor still in possession."

It was as Harry dodged another Bludger, which went spinning dangerously past his head, that it happened. His broom gave a sudden, frightening lurch. For a split second, he thought he was going to fall. He gripped the broom tightly with both his hands and knees. He'd never felt anything like that.

It happened again. It was as though the broom was trying to buck him off. But Nimbus Two Thousands did not suddenly decide to buck their riders off. Harry tried to turn back toward the Slytherin goal posts – he had half a mind to ask Flint to call time-out – and then he realized that his broom was completely out of his control. He couldn't turn it. He couldn't direct it at all. It was zigzagging through the air, and every now and then making violent swishing movements that almost unseated him.

Lee was still commentating.

"Slytherin in possession – Flint with the Quaffle – passes Spinnet – passes Bell – hit hard in the face by a Bludger, hope it broke his nose – only joking, Professor – Malfoy takes the Quaffle – Slytherins score – oh no . . ."

The Slytherins were cheering. No one seemed to have noticed that Harry's broom was behaving strangely. It was carrying him slowly higher, away from the game, jerking and twitching as it went.

Goyle gave a deep laugh.

"Look at Potter!"

Suddenly, people were pointing up at Harry all over the stands. His broom had started to roll over and over, with him only just managing to hold on. Then the whole crowd gasped. Harry's broom had given a wild jerk and Harry swung off it. He was now dangling from it, holding on with only one hand.

"He's not playing around, is he?" Pansy gasped.

Malvora began looking around at the crowd.

"Ah," she said under her breath.

Snape was a few rows down and over. He had his eyes fixed on Harry and was muttering nonstop under his breath.

"Jinxing the broom," she muttered.

Harry's broom was vibrating so hard, it was almost impossible for him to hang on much longer. The whole crowd was on its feet, watching, terrified, as Draco and Adrian flew up to try and pull Harry safely onto one of their brooms, but it was no good – every time they got near him, the broom would jump higher still. They dropped lower and circled beneath him, obviously hoping to catch him if he fell. Flint seized the Quaffle and scored five times without anyone noticing.

"I can't see Draco!" Pansy whined, trying to peer over the heads of students standing in front of her.

"Over here, Pansy," Mal said, darting across the rows to be above Snape.

Pansy followed, hoping to get a better viewpoint of Draco. Malvora stopped, two rows above Snape.

"Stand in front of me," she said to Pansy, who hastily obeyed.

"This isn't any better than over there," Pansy complained, standing on the seat in front of Mal.

Malvora suddenly shoved the other girl forward with all her might. Pansy screamed and fell helplessly over the rows, straight into Snape, who jumped up in surprise and tumbled backwards into Professor Quirrell, who was sitting in the row in front. Snape cursed, no longer chanting under his breath.

The chaos was enough. Up in the air, Harry was suddenly able to clamber back onto his broom.

"Oops!" Mal yelled down to Pansy. "Sorry!"

Harry was speeding toward the ground when the crowd saw him clap his hand to his mouth as though he was about to be sick – he hit the field on all fours – coughed – and something gold fell into his hand.

"I've got the Snitch!" he shouted, waving it above his head, and the game ended in complete confusion.

"He didn't catch it, he nearly _swallowed _it," Ophelia Hart was still complaining twenty minutes later, but it made no difference – Harry hadn't broken any rules and Lee Jordan sadly told the results – Slytherin had won by one hundred eighty points to seventy. Harry heard none of this, though. He was being made a cup of strong tea back in Hagrid's hut, with Draco and Malvora.

"It was definitely Snape," Mal was saying. "I saw him cursing Harry's broomstick, muttering and whatnot. When I knocked him over was when Harry could fly again."

"Rubbish," said Hagrid. "Why would Snape do somethin' like that?"

Harry, Draco, and Mal looked at one another, wondering what to tell him. Harry decided on the truth.

"I found out something about him," he told Hagrid. "He tried to get past that three-headed dog on Halloween. It bit him. We think he was trying to steal whatever it's guarding."

Hagrid dropped the teapot.

"How do you know about Fluffy?" he said.

"_Fluffy?_"

"Cute," Mal commented.

"Yeah – he's mine – bought him off a Greek chappie I met in the pub las' year – I lent him to Dumbledore to guard the –"

"Yes?" said Harry eagerly.

"Now, don't ask me anymore," said Hagrid gruffly. "That's top secret, that is."

"But Snape's trying to _steal _it."

"Rubbish," said Hagrid again. "Snape's a Hogwarts teacher, he'd do nothin' of the sort."

"So he just tried to kill Harry for sport, then?" asked Draco.

"I'm tellin' yeh, yer wrong!" said Hagrid hotly. "I don' know why Harry's broom acted like that, but Snape wouldn' try an' kill a student! Now, listen to me, all three of yeh – yer meddlin' in things that don' concern yeh. It's dangerous. You forget that dog, an' you forget what it's guardin', that's between Professor Dumbledore an' Nicolas Flamel –"

"Aha!" said Harry, "so there's someone called Nicolas Flamel involved, is there?"

Hagrid looked furious with himself.


	7. The Mirror of Erised

**Authors' Note: **Cool how we released this chap right before Christmas, eh? Clever, clever! XD

Now, in regards to Jooheika's review: You were sharp in noticing that the Madam Malkin's scene was striked from the story. Indeed, we meant to imply that Harry's first real meeting with Draco did not happen, therefore Harry was never pushed to ask Hagrid about the four Houses or about where his parents had been sorted, so that he had no bias before meeting Draco on the train. Thank you for bringing that up.

As for the parallelism of this fic and how much it will mirror the original: As we have stated before, this fic will mirror the main points of the original story, with the differences being in the different characters and the way they interact affecting small details of the story. Unfortunately, we found that in this particular fanfiction, it was necessary to keep the plot points mostly the same as in the original, so it will mirror quite a bit (Ironic that this chapter is the _Mirror _of Erised). Again, these minor alterations were planted so as to have a much greater effect on the fics to come. We have written six chapters of the sequel, which vary so much from the original as to make it almost unrecognizable.

Finally, on the point of Malvora Melbarke: Thank you for your praise of this character. It would seem we achieved what we were hoping for, and that was creating a character who fit in with the cast and could progress the storyline without being a know-it-all Gryffindor.

Jooheika, your analysis of the story is greatly appreciated. ^ _ ^ We would encourage anyone who has opinions, criticisms, or questions to review so that we might improve the quality of our work.

* * *

Christmas was coming. One morning in mid-December, Hogwarts woke to find itself covered in several feet of snow. The lake froze solid and students were punished for bewitching snowballs so that they followed Quirrell around, bouncing off the back of his turban. The few owls that managed to battle their way through the stormy sky to deliver mail had to be nursed back to health by Hagrid before they could fly off again.

No one could wait for the holidays to start. While the Great Hall had a roaring fire, the drafty corridors had become icy and a bitter wind rattled the windows in the classrooms. The Slytherin common room was among the coldest places in the castle, worst of all being Professor Snape's classes, where their breath rose in a mist before them and they kept as close as possible to their hot cauldrons.

"I'll be glad to go home for Christmas," said Draco, one Potions class.

"I'm staying," said Harry.

It was true that Harry wasn't going back to Privet Drive for Christmas. Snape had come around the week before, making a list of students who would be staying for the holidays, and Harry had signed up at once. He didn't feel sorry for himself at all; this would probably be the best Christmas he'd ever had. Malvora was staying, too, because her parents were out of the country on business.

When they left the dungeons at the end of Potions, they found a large fir tree blocking the corridor ahead. Two enormous feet sticking out at the bottom and a loud puffing sound told them that Hagrid was behind it.

The youngest Weasley was offering to help Hagrid with the tree. Draco had taken a personal disliking of Ron Weasley, because Ron had made a point of accusing Draco of cheating his way onto the Quidditch team after the match. Not that he'd liked him beforehand, but now, the red-haired boy was Draco's very favorite target.

"Would you mind moving out of the way?" Draco drawled behind Ron and Hagrid. "Are you trying to earn some extra money, Weasley? Hoping to be gamekeeper yourself when you leave Hogwarts, I suppose – that hut of Hagrid's must seem like a palace compared to what your family's used to."

Ron dived at Draco just as Snape came up the stairs.

"WEASLEY!"

Ron let go of the front of Draco's robes.

"Fighting is against Hogwarts rules," said Snape silkily. "Five points from Gryffindor, Weasley, and be grateful it isn't more. Move along, all of you."

Draco, Harry, and Malvora skirted along past the tree, scattering needles everywhere.

"You shouldn't have said any of that," Harry said immediately when they were out of hearing distance.

"Always quick to defend, aren't you Potter?" Draco snapped.

"Look," said Harry, "I'm already pushing my luck with Snape as it is. It doesn't help when you go around picking trouble."

"You're making a bad name for us," Malvora added.

"Since when do you care about your name?" cried Draco.

"I don't really," Malvora shrugged, "I just thought Harry might. He is the boy who lived, after all. Don't want to make it, 'The boy who trailed along after spoiled little Malfoy.'"

Harry couldn't agree more.

"Don't expect me to leave Weasley alone," said Draco.

"Oh, by all means, provoke him when you're alone with him," said Mal, "but you should be warned, I won't keep from telling the rest of the House how you got beat up by a Weasley."

"Stop fighting," said Harry before Draco could retaliate. "It's nearly Christmas. Let's go see what the Great Hall looks like."

So the three of them went into the Great Hall, where Hagrid was putting up the Christmas tree and Professor McGonagall and Professor Flitwick were busy with the Christmas decorations.

The hall looked spectacular. Festoons of holly and mistletoe hung all around the walls, and no less than twelve towering Christmas trees stood around the room, some sparkling with tiny icicles, some glittering with hundreds of candles.

"One more day until the holidays," said Mal, in awe.

"That reminds me," said Harry, "We should be in the library, trying to find out more about Nicolas Flamel."

"Oh yeah," said Mal, tearing her eyes away from Professor Flitwick, who had golden bubbles blossoming out of his wand and was trailing them over the branches of the new tree.

"Hey Hagrid," she called as they followed him out of the Great Hall. "Sure you don't want to tell us more about Nicolas Flamel?"

Hagrid looked shocked.

"Listen here – I've told yeh – drop it. It's nothin' to you what that dog's guardin'."

"That's what I've been trying to say," mumbled Draco.

"We must've been through hundreds of books already and we can't find him anywhere," said Harry. "Just give us a hint."

"I'm sayin' nothin'," said Hagrid flatly.

"Well then, we'll just have to put ourselves in unnecessary trouble and find out ourselves," said Malvora, cheerfully, and they left Hagrid looking disgruntled and hurried off to the library.

They had indeed been searching books for Flamel's name ever since Hagrid had let it slip, because how else were they going to find out what Snape was trying to steal? The trouble was, it was very hard to know where to begin, not knowing what Flamel might have done to get himself into a book. He wasn't in _Great Wizards of the Twentieth Century, _or _Notable Magical Names of Our Time; _he was missing, too, from _Important Modern Magical Discoveries, _and _A Study of Recent Developments in Wizardry. _And then, of course, there was the sheer size of the library; tens of thousands of books; thousands of shelves; hundreds of narrow rows.

Malvora tried a number of spells to see if she could get a book to come to her with Flamel's name in it, while Draco muttered and complained about wasting his time with meaningless tasks. Harry wandered over to the Restricted Section. Malvora had been the first to suggest that Flamel might be somewhere in there. Unfortunately, you needed a specially signed note from one of the teachers to look in any of the restricted books, and Harry knew he'd never get one. These were the books containing powerful Dark Magic never taught at Hogwarts, and only read by older students studying advanced Defense Against the Dark Arts.

"What are you looking for, boy?"

"Nothing," said Harry,

Madam Pince the librarian brandished a feather duster at him.

"You'd better get out, then. Go on – out!"

Wishing he'd been a bit quicker at thinking up some story, Harry left the library. He, Draco, and Malvora had already agreed they'd better not ask Madam Pince where they could find Flamel. They were sure she'd be able to tell them, but they couldn't risk someone hearing what they were up to. This was all a very secret business to the three of them.

Harry waited outside in the corridor to see if the other two had found anything, but he wasn't very hopeful. They had only been looking for two weeks, after all, but as they only had odd moments between lessons it wasn't surprising they'd found nothing. What they really needed was a nice long search without Madam Pince breathing down their necks.

Five minutes later, Draco and Malvora joined him, scowling. They went off to lunch.

"This isn't any of our business," Draco groaned, "We should stay out of it."

"You're such a coward," Malvora teased, re-enacting Draco's girly scream from when they fought the troll.

"No," snapped Draco, "I just have better things to do with my time than trying to solve mysteries that involve illegal three-headed dogs and trolls."

"Well, let's cut you some slack, then. All you have to do is ask your parents about Flamel while you're on your happy vacation, and Harry and I will use all other means to find out on our own. Not too much work for you, I hope."

Draco merely sneered.

Once the holidays had started, Harry and Malvora were having too good a time to think much about Flamel. They had the dormitories to themselves and the common room was completely empty, so they were able to get the good sofa by the fire. They sat by the hour, eating anything they could spear on a toasting fork – bread, English muffins, marshmallows – and plotting ways to kidnap Madam Pince and force her to tell them about Flamel.

Malvora also spent a fair deal of time trying to teach Harry how to be clever. These included such tasks as discovering secret passageways, learning spells that would quiet your steps, and playing strategy games like wizard chess. Malvora was convinced that once they discovered who Flamel was, they were going to have to use cunning to take the next step – whatever that step may be. Therefore, she secured a wizard chess set (Harry didn't ask where she got it from) and began to teach him the basics so that he could "sharpen his mind."

Wizard chess was exactly like Muggle chess, except that the figures were alive, which made it a lot like directing troops in battle. Harry wasn't a very good player yet and his chessmen kept shouting different bits of advice at him, which was confusing. "Don't send me there, can't you see her knight? Send _him, _we can afford to lose _him_."

On Christmas Eve, Harry went to bed looking forward to the next day for the food and the fun, but not expecting any presents at all. When he woke early in the morning, however, the first thing he saw when he entered the common room, was a small Christmas Tree with a pile of presents beneath it.

"Morning," said Mal, who was stretched out on the sofa as if she had slept there all night. "Those presents are for us. We're the only Slytherins not at home, after all."

Harry walked over to the tree with Malvora and picked up the top parcel. It was wrapped in thick brown paper and scrawled across it was To Harry, from Hagrid. Inside was a roughly cut wooden flute. Hagrid had obviously whittled it himself. Harry blew it – it sounded a bit like an owl.

A second, very small parcel contained a note.

_We received your message and enclose your Christmas Present. From Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia. _Taped to the note was a fifty-pence piece.

"That's friendly," said Harry.

Malvora was fascinated by the fifty pence.

"How peculiar!" she said, "This is Muggle money?"

"You can keep it," said Harry, laughing at the expression on Mal's face. "Hagrid and my aunt and uncle – so who sent these?"

"That's from Draco," Malvora pointed at a neatly wrapped parcel. "It's got his family crest on it. Odd, I was betting on him being selfish and not sending you anything."

Harry tore open the parcel to find a rather expensive-looking wristwatch and some chocolate frogs.

"He didn't write a note," said Malvora, passively. "Must not want to admit that he thinks you're his friend."

"Thoughtful, though," said Harry, strapping on the watch.

"I don't believe it," Malvora muttered. She was holding her own parcel, wrapped as perfectly as Harry's and with the Malfoy crest stamped onto it. She ripped it open and gasped in delight as she pulled out a shimmering feather coat. "Athenan Dragon feathers!" she squeaked, slipping it on. Her expression changed slightly from overjoyed to a bit flustered.

"What's wrong?" asked Harry.

"Now, I have nothing to use to blackmail him."

"I'm sure you'll find something," said Harry, which seemed to lift her spirits significantly.

Harry had only one parcel left. He picked it up and felt it. It was very light. He unwrapped it.

Something fluid and silvery gray went slithering to the floor where it lay in gleaming folds. Malvora gasped.

"Impossible," she said in a hushed voice, losing interest in her coat. "It can't be… Those are even more rare and valuable than dragon feathers."

"What is it?"

Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into material.

"An Invisibility Cloak," said Malvora in awe. "Well, try it on!"

Harry threw the cloak around his shoulders and Malvora clapped her hands in excitement.

"Look, look at your reflection!"

She ran to the windows facing the lake, where her reflection looked back, clear as day. Harry came to stand beside her, but didn't see his own reflection staring back. He looked down at his feet, but they were gone. He pulled the cloak down and he was just a head suspended in midair, his body completely invisible.

"You've got a note, too," said Mal, stooping to pick a note off the floor.

Harry pulled off the cloak and seized the letter. Written in narrow, loopy writing he had never seen before were the following words:

Your father left this in my possession before

he died. It is time it was returned to you.

Use it well.

A very Merry Christmas to you.

There was no signature. Harry stared at the note. Malvora was trying on the cloak.

"I could sneak anywhere with one of these," she said. "If this ever goes missing for a couple of days, don't worry about it - What's the matter?"

"Nothing," said Harry. He felt very strange. Who had sent the cloak? Had it really once belonged to his father?

"Cheer up," Malvora ordered, chucking a pillow at him. "It's Christmas and I didn't get a single present from my parents!" A wide smile spread over her face. "That's cause for celebration!"

The Invisibility Cloak was put out of Harry's mind temporarily, as the festivities began.

Harry had never in all his life had such a Christmas dinner. A hundred fat, roast turkeys; mountains of roast and boiled potatoes; platters of chipolatas; tureens of buttered peas, silver boats of thick, rich gravy and cranberry sauce – and stacks of wizard crackers every few feet along the table. These fantastic party favors were nothing like the feeble Muggle ones the Dursleys usually bought, with their little plastic toys and their flimsy paper hats inside. Harry pulled a wizard cracker with Malvora and it didn't just bang, it went off with a blast like a cannon and engulfed them in a cloud of blue smoke, while from the inside exploded a rear admiral's hat and several live, white mice. Up at the High Table, Dumbledore had swapped his pointed wizard's hat for a flowered bonnet, and was chuckling merrily at a joke Professor Flitwick had just read him.

Flaming Christmas puddings followed the turkey. Harry watched Hagrid getting redder and redder in the face as he called for more wine, finally kissing Professor McGonagall on the cheek, who, to Harry's amazement, giggled and blushed, her top hat lopsided.

When Harry finally left the table, he was laden down with a stack of things out of the crackers, including a pack of non-explodable, luminous balloons, a Grow-Your-Own-Warts kit, and his own new wizard chess set. The white mice had disappeared and Harry had a nasty feeling, as he looked at Malvora's wiggling pockets, they were going to end up as Camo's Christmas dinner.

Harry and Malvora spent a happy afternoon having a furious snowball fight on the grounds. Well, it would have just been them, if Malvora hadn't taken it upon herself to hunt down unsuspecting members of other Houses and pelt them with snowballs. They successfully drenched a Ravenclaw named Gregory Grayson who was just out reading, and soaked two Hufflepuffs who were building a snow fort. At last, they started a war with a Gryffindor named Theresa Goodwin and then, cold, wet, and gasping for breath, they returned to the fire in the Slytherin common room, where Harry broke out his new chess set by losing spectacularly to Mal.

After a meal of turkey sandwiches, crumpets, trifle, and Christmas cake, they felt too full and sleepy to do much before bed except sit and watch Camo chase an ornament around the common room.

It had been Harry's best Christmas day ever. Yet something had been nagging at the back of his mind all day. Not until he climbed into bed was he free to think about it: the Invisibility Cloak and whoever had sent it.

Malvora, full of turkey and cake and with nothing mysterious to bother her, had fallen asleep out on the sofa in the common room, where Harry suspected she'd been sleeping the whole holiday break. Harry, at last, leaned over the side of his own bed and pulled the cloak from under it.

His father's. . . this had been his father's. He let the material flow over his hands, smoother than silk, light as air. _Use it well, _the note had said.

He had to try it, now. He slipped out of bed and wrapped the cloak around himself. Looking down at his legs, he saw only moonlight and shadows. It was a very funny feeling.

_Use it well. _

Suddenly, Harry felt wide-awake. The whole of Hogwarts was open to him in this cloak. Excitement flooded through him as he stood there in the dark and silence. He could go anywhere in this, anywhere, and Filch would never know.

He crept out of the dormitory, up the stairs, and across the common room. Malvora's hand was dangling off the sofa. Should Harry wake her? Something held him back – his father's cloak – he felt that this time – the first time – he wanted to use it alone.

He snuck as quietly as possible through the darkness, past a snoozing Camo, and down the passageway that led into the corridor.

Where should he go? He stopped, his heart racing, and thought. And then it came to him. The Restricted Section in the library. He'd be able to read as long as he liked, as long as it took to find out who Flamel was. He set off, drawing the Invisibility Cloak tight around him as he walked.

The library was pitch-black and very eerie. Harry lit a lamp to see his way along the rows of books. The lamp looked as if it was floating along in midair, and even though Harry could feel his arm supporting it, the sight gave him the creeps.

The Restricted Section was right at the back of the library. Stepping carefully over the rope that separated these books from the rest of the library, he held up his lamp to read the titles.

They didn't tell him much. Their peeling, faded gold letters spelled words in languages Harry couldn't understand. Some had no title at all. One book had a dark stain on it that looked horribly like blood. The hairs on the back of Harry's neck prickled. Maybe he was imagining it, maybe not, but he thought a faint whispering was coming from the books, as though they knew someone was there who shouldn't be.

He had to start somewhere. Setting the lamp down carefully on the floor, he looked along the bottom shelf for an interesting-looking book. A large black and silver volume caught his eye. He pulled it out with difficulty, because it was very heavy, and, balancing it on his knee, let it fall open.

A piercing, bloodcurdling shriek split the silence – the book was screaming! Harry snapped it shut, but the shriek went on and on, one high, unbroken, earsplitting note. He stumbled backward and knocked over his lamp, which went out at once. Panicking, he heard footsteps coming down the corridor outside – stuffing the shrieking book back on the shelf, he ran for it. He passed Filch in the doorway; Filch's pale, wild eyes looked straight through him, and Harry slipped under Filch's outstretched arm and streaked off up the corridor, the book's shrieks still ringing in his ears.

He came to a sudden halt in front of a tall suit of armor. He had been so busy getting away from the library, he hadn't paid attention to where he was going. Perhaps because it was dark, he didn't recognize where he was at all. There was a suit of armor near the kitchens, he knew, but he must be five floors above there.

"You asked me to come directly to you, Professor, if anyone was wandering around at night, and someone's been in the library – Restricted Section."

Harry felt the blood drain out of his face. Wherever he was, Filch must know a shortcut, because his soft, greasy voice was getting nearer, and to his horror, it was Snape who replied, "The Restricted Section? Well, they can't be far, we'll catch them."

Harry stood rooted to the spot as Filch and Snape came around the corner ahead. They couldn't see him, of course, but it was a narrow corridor and if they came much nearer they'd knock right into him – the cloak didn't stop him from being solid.

He backed away as quietly as he could. A door stood ajar to his left. It was his only hope. He squeezed through it, holding his breath, trying not to move it, and to his relief he managed to get inside the room without their noticing anything. They walked straight past, and Harry leaned against the wall, breathing deeply, listening to their footsteps dying away. That had been close, very close. It was a few seconds before he noticed anything about the room he had hidden in.

It looked like an unused classroom. The dark shapes of desks and chairs were piled against the walls, and there was an upturned wastepaper basket – but propped against the wall facing him was something that didn't look as if it belonged there, something that looked as if someone had just put it there to keep it out of the way.

It was a magnificent mirror, as high as the ceiling, with an ornate gold frame, standing on two clawed feet. There was an inscription carved around the top: _Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. _

His panic fading now that there was no sound of Filch and Snape, Harry moved nearer to the mirror, wanting to look at himself but see no reflection again. He stepped in front of it.

He had to clap his hand to his mouth to stop himself from screaming. He whirled around. His heart was pounding far more furiously than when the book had screamed – for he had seen not only himself in the mirror, but a whole crowd of people standing right behind him.

But the room was empty. Breathing very fast, he turned slowly back to the mirror.

There he was, reflected in it, white and scared-looking, and there, reflected behind him, were at least ten others. Harry looked over his shoulder – but still, no one was there. Or were they all invisible too? Was he in fact in a room full of invisible people and this mirror's trick was that it reflected them, invisible or not?

He looked in the mirror again. A woman standing right behind his reflection was smiling at him and waving. He reached out a hand and felt the air behind him. If she was really there, he'd touch her, their reflections were so close together, but he felt only air – she and the others existed only in the mirror.

She was a very pretty woman. She had dark red hair and her eyes – _her eyes are just like mine, _Harry thought, edging a little closer to the glass. Bright green – exactly the same shape, but then he noticed that she was crying; smiling, but crying at the same time. The tall, thin, black-haired man standing next to her put his arm around her. He wore glasses, and his hair was very untidy. It stuck up at the back, just as Harry's did.

Harry was so close to the mirror now that his nose was nearly touching that of his reflection.

"Mom?" he whispered. "Dad?"

They just looked at him, smiling. And slowly, Harry looked into the faces of the other people in the mirror, and saw other pairs of green eyes like his, other noses like his, even a little old man who looked as though he had Harry's knobbly knees – Harry was looking at his family, for the first time in his life.

The Potters smiled and waved at Harry and he stared hungrily back at them, his hands pressed flat against the glass as though he was hoping to fall right through it and reach them. He had a powerful kind of ache inside him, half joy, half terrible sadness.

How long he stood there, he didn't know. The reflections did not fade and he looked and looked until a distant noise brought him back to his senses. He couldn't stay here, he had to find his way back to bed. He tore his eyes away from his mother's face, whispered, "I'll come back," and hurried from the room.

"Sounds dark," said Malvora, thoughtfully.

Harry had to tell her about the mirror. She'd known as soon as she saw him in the morning that he'd been up to something. So he relayed the previous night's story to her, hoping she would have some theory about the mirror, or perhaps had seen it before when she was sneaking around the castle.

"You can come tonight, I'm going back, you can take a look at the mirror for yourself."

"And see the whole family of famous Potters?" she laughed. "What an honor."

"I could see your family, too," said Harry.

Malvora's eyes darkened.

"Let's hope that it only shows dead people," she said. Her expression reverted to normal rather quickly, "Anyway, it's too bad you didn't find anything about Flamel. You should have been sneakier. Not eating?"

Harry couldn't eat. He had seen his parents and would be seeing them again tonight. He had almost forgotten about Flamel. It didn't seem very important anymore. Who cared about the three-headed dog and what it was guarding? What did it matter if Snape stole it, really?

What Harry feared most was that he might not be able to find the mirror room again. With Mal covered in the cloak, too, they had to walk much more slowly the next night. They tried retracing Harry's route from the library, wandering around the dark passageways for nearly an hour.

"I haven't checked on Camo for a while," said Mal. "We could always look for the room in the daytime."

"_No!"_ Harry hissed. "I know it's here somewhere."

They passed the ghost of a tall witch gliding in the opposite direction, but saw no one else. Just as Mal was about to turn around and leave Harry alone in the hall, Harry spotted the suit of armor.

"It's here – just here – yes!"

They pushed the door open. Harry dropped the cloak from around his shoulders and ran to the mirror.

There they were. His mother and father beamed at the sight of him.

"See?" Harry whispered.

"No," said Mal, who was standing uncertainly by the door, as if she feared what she might see in the mirror.

"Look! Look at them… there are loads of them…"

"Looks like a normal mirror to me."

"Look in it properly, go on, stand where I am"

Harry stepped aside, and Malvora hesitantly stepped in front of the mirror. With her there, Harry couldn't see his family anymore, just Malvora in her Athenan feather coat.

Malvora, though, was staring transfixed at her image.

"Whoa!"

"Can you see all your family standing around you?"

"Of course not, stupid," she snapped. "I'm all alone – well unless you count Camo – and all the dragons!"

_"What?"_

"You heard me! There's a miniature Zuffian – and a Styxian dragon!"

Malvora tore her eyes away from this splendid sight to look excitedly at Harry.

"Let me have another look," said Harry.

"No."

"You're only surrounded by dragons, what's interesting about that? I want to see my parents."

"I said no –"

A sudden noise outside the corridor put an end to their discussion. They hadn't realized how loudly they'd been talking.

"Quick!"

Malvora threw the cloak back over them as the luminous eyes of Mrs. Norris came around the door. Mal and Harry stood quite still, both thinking the same thing – did the cloak work on cats? After what seemed an age, she turned and left.

"And off to Filch she goes. Come on."

And Malvora pulled Harry out of the room.

The snow still hadn't melted the next morning.

"Let's finish our round of chess," said Mal.

"No."

"Well then, why don't we sneak attack students outside again?"

"No… you go…"

Malvora sighed an angry sound.

"You're being an idiot, you know that?" she accused.

"What's that mean?" Harry snapped, angrily.

"You want to go back to that mirror. Don't. It's definitely got dark powers in it, and messing with those should be avoided. Plus, you get so lost in that thing that you won't even notice if Filch or Snape came into the room. You'd be in a lot of trouble."

"What do you know about it, anyway?" said Harry.

Malvora shrugged, eyes narrowed.

"Nothing, really. It could be totally safe, so have fun." With this, she turned and walked away

But Harry only had one thought in his head, which was to get back in front of the mirror, and Malvora wasn't going to stop him.

That third night he found his way more quickly than before. He was walking so fast he knew he was making more noise than was wise, but he didn't meet anyone.

And there were his mother and father smiling at him again, and one of his grandfathers nodding happily. Harry sank down to sit on the floor in front of the mirror. There was nothing to stop him from staying here all night with his family. Nothing at all.

Except –

"So – back again, Harry?"

Harry felt as though his insides had turned to ice. He looked behind him. Sitting on one of the desks by the wall was none other than Albus Dumbledore. Harry must have walked straight past him, so desperate to get to the mirror he hadn't noticed him.

"I – I didn't see you, sir."

"Strange how nearsighted being invisible can make you," said Dumbledore, and Harry was relieved to see that he was smiling.

"So," said Dumbledore, slipping off the desk to sit on the floor with Harry, "you, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised."

"I didn't know it was called that, sir."

"But I expect you've realized by now what it does?"

"It – well – shows me my family –"

"And it showed your friend Mal herself with dragons."

"How did you know –?"

"I don't need a cloak to become invisible," said Dumbledore gently. "Now, can you think what the Mirror of Erised shows us all?"

Harry shook his head.

"Let me explain. The happiest man on earth would be able to use the Mirror of Erised like a normal mirror, that is, he would look into it and see himself exactly as he is. Does that help?"

Harry thought. Then he said slowly, "It shows us what we want… whatever we want…"

"Yes and no," said Dumbledore quietly. "It shows us nothing more or less than the deepest, most desperate desire of our hearts. You, who have never known your family, see them standing around you. Malvora Melbarke, who is ashamed and embarrassed by her own family, sees herself standing with the company of dragons, which she finds to be much more relatable than humans. However, this mirror will give us neither knowledge or truth. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible.

"The Mirror will be moved to a new home tomorrow, Harry, and I ask you not to go looking for it again. If you ever _do _run across it, you will now be prepared. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that. Now, why don't you put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?"

Harry stood up.

"Sir – Professor Dumbledore? Can I ask you something?"

"Obviously, you've just done so," Dumbledore smiled. "You may ask me one more thing, however."

"What do you see when you look in the mirror?"

"I? I see myself holding a pair of thick, woolen socks."

Harry stared.

"One can never have enough socks," said Dumbledore. "Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books."

It was only when he was back in bed that it struck Harry that Dumbledore might not have been quite truthful. But then, he thought, it had been quite a personal question.


	8. Nicolas Flamel

Dumbledore had convinced Harry not to go looking for the Mirror of Erised again, and for the rest of the Christmas holidays the Invisibility Cloak stayed folded at the bottom of his trunk. Harry wished he could forget what he'd seen in the mirror as easily, but he couldn't. He started having nightmares. Over and over again he dreamed about his parents disappearing in a flash of green light, while a high voice cracked with laughter.

"Told you so," said Malvora, when Harry told her about the dangers of the mirror.

Draco, who came back the day before term started, took a different view of things. He seemed spitefully jealous when hearing about the adventures Harry and Mal had over the break, because they were much more exciting than the ones he'd had at home, and he hadn't brought back any news about who Nicolas Flamel was.

They had almost given up hope of ever finding Flamel in a library book, even though Harry was still sure he'd read the name somewhere. Once term had started, they were back to skimming through books for ten minutes during their breaks. Harry and Draco had even less time than Malvora, because Quidditch practice had started again.

Flint was training the team harder than ever. Even the endless rain that had replaced the snow couldn't halt his determination. Harry was on his side. Slytherin was on the top in the Championship, and he wanted to keep it that way. If Ravenclaw won this match, they'd tie Slytherin for the House Championship. Quite apart from wanting to win, Harry found that he had fewer nightmares when he was tired out after training.

Then, during one particularly wet and muddy practice session, Flint gave the team what he considered to be good news.

"Snape's refereeing this match," he said, with a troll-like grin. "We're bound to win."

Draco brimmed happily at these words.

"He'll be sure to favor Slytherin over Ravenclaw."

The rest of the team landed next to Draco to agree, too. It was all very well, thought Harry, but he had a reason for not wanting Snape near him while he was playing Quidditch.

The rest of the team hung back to talk to one another as usual at the end of practice, but Harry and Draco headed straight back to the Slytherin common room, where Malvora was doodling inside the pages of a library book.

"Sh," she warned, as she shaded in the tail of the dragon she was drawing.

"Mal, listen," said Harry. She looked up at them.

Speaking quietly so that no one else would hear, Harry told her about Snape's sudden, sinister desire to be Quidditch referee.

"It's good for Slytherin," said Draco.

"But bad for Harry," said Mal.

"Well he's got to play," Draco snapped. "There's no reserve Seeker."

"We could always just kill Snape," Mal suggested. "Before he can get to Harry."

Harry had almost suggested the same thing.

At that moment, Pansy strutted into the common room. She looked absolutely outrageous in her new clothes she'd gotten for Christmas. She had the resemblance of a peacock.

She approached Harry, Malvora, and Draco fearlessly, but turned to address Draco.

"Hello," she said, smugly.

"Pansy, can't you see we're having a conversation?" said Mal. "Didn't your parents teach you any manners?"

"I'm not here for you, Melbarke!" Pansy snapped, still harboring hard feelings after being pushed down the stands at the last Quidditch match.

"Draco," said Pansy, in a cooler tone, "I never got to give you your Christmas present or congratulate you on how great you were in that Quidditch game before holiday."

Draco looked pleased with himself. Malvora punched him in the arm.

"Get to the point, Pansy," said Harry, who was still desperate to discuss Snape's purpose at the next match.

"I've gotten you something," she held out a box of chocolate frogs, her cheeks red.

"I'm going to be sick," groaned Mal.

"How very thoughtful, Pansy," said Draco, with a sneer at Mal. "I'll enjoy these."

Pansy could have died with glee.

"You can go, now," said Draco. Pansy nodded, still smiling widely, and blindly made her way toward the dormitories.

Malvora snatched the chocolates out of Draco's hands.

"Here, Harry, have one," she tossed a frog to Harry.

"Those are _mine, _Melbarke!"

"Ooh, look! She put a note inside the box!"

"Mal, I swear, I'll curse you if you don't give that to me!"

"Oy, who wants to hear Pansy's love confession to Draco?"

Harry ignored them as he stared up at the frozen surface of the lake and opened the chocolate frog. There was a card inside, for collectors. It had a shimmering picture of Dumbledore on it.

He gasped. He stared at the back of the card. Then he looked up at Draco and Mal, who were locked in a wrestling stance.

"_I've found him!" _Harry whispered. "I've found Flamel! I knew I'd read his name somewhere before! Listen to this: 'Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the Dark wizard Grindelwald in 1945, for the discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's blood, _and his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel'!_"

Malvora was stone still, her face a mixture of shock and confusion.

"Hold on," she tossed the box of chocolates on the floor and reached for the library book she'd been doodling in.

"It was right under my nose the whole time!" she whispered excitedly. "I took this from the library weeks ago because I needed scratch paper."

"You could have just gotten blank parchment," said Draco, but Mal told him to shut up until she'd found something, and started flicking through the pages, muttering to herself.

At last she found what she was looking for.

"Ha!"

"Is it a drawing of Fluffy?" said Draco, irritably. Malvora ignored him.

"Nicolas Flamel," she stated, dramatically, "is the _only known maker of the Sorcerer's Stone!"_

This didn't have quite the effect she'd expected.

"The what?" said Harry and Draco.

"I thought the great Malfoy would at least know about it. Read this."

She pushed the book toward them, and Harry and Draco read:

_The ancient study of alchemy is concerned with mak-_

_ing the Sorcerer's Stone, a legendary substance with as-_

_tonishing powers. The Stone will transform any metal_

_into pure gold. It also produces the Elixir of Life,_

_which will make the drinker immortal._

_There have been many reports of the Sorcerer's _

_Stone over the centuries, but the only Stone currently_

_in existence belongs to Mr. Nicolas Flamel, the noted_

_alchemist and opera lover. Mr. Flamel, who cele-_

_brated his six hundred and sixty-fifth birthday last_

_year, enjoys a quiet life in Devon with his wife, _

_Perenelle (six hundred and fifty-eight)._

"So," said Malvora, when Harry and Draco had finished. "Fluffy is guarding Flamel's Sorcerer's Stone! He knew someone was looking for it, so he moved it out of Gringotts to Hogwarts, since Dumbledore's his old friend."

"A stone that makes gold and stops you from ever dying!" said Harry. "No wonder Snape's after it! _Anyone _would want it."

Even Draco had to be somewhat excited by this news.

"Not that I would need the extra gold," he said, "but living to be six hundred and sixty-five…"

The next morning in Defense Against the Dark Arts, while copying down different ways of treating werewolf bites, Harry and Draco were still discussing what they'd do with a Sorcerer's Stone if they had one. It wasn't until Draco said he'd buy his own Quidditch team that Harry remembered about Snape and the coming match.

"I'm going to play," he told Draco and Mal. "If I don't, our House will never forgive me."

"I'll never forgive you," said Draco.

As the match drew nearer, however, Harry became more and more nervous, whatever he told Draco and Malvora. The rest of the team was completely calm, and even ventured to make jokes about Snape's obvious bias toward the team.

Harry didn't know whether he was imagining it or not, but he seemed to keep running into Snape wherever he went. At times, he even wondered whether Snape was following him, trying to catch him on his own. Could Snape possibly know they'd found out about the Sorcerer's Stone? Harry didn't see how he could – yet sometimes had the horrible feeling that Snape could read minds.

Harry knew, when she wished him good luck outside the locker rooms the next afternoon, that Malvora was wondering if she'd ever see him alive again. This wasn't what you'd call comforting. Harry hardly heard a word of Flint's threats as he pulled on his Quidditch robes and picked up his Nimbus Two Thousand.

Malvora, meanwhile, had found a place in the stands uncomfortably close to Pansy, who wouldn't be quiet about Draco accepting her chocolate frogs. Little did Harry and Draco know that Mal had been secretly practicing all manner of curses. She was ready to use them on Snape if he showed any sign of wanting to hurt Harry.

Back in the locker room, Flint had taken Harry aside.

"Look, the rest of us are going to do whatever we can to smash Ravenclaw, but I suggest you get the Snitch fast, got it?"

"The whole school's out there!" said Adrian Pucey, peering out the door. "Including – bad news, team. Dumbledore too."

Harry's heart did a somersault.

"_Dumbledore?_" he said, dashing to the door to make sure. Pucey was right. There was no mistaking that silver beard.

Harry could have laughed out loud with relief. He was safe. There was simply no way that Snape would dare to try and hurt him if Dumbledore was watching. The rest of the team, however, was not pleased. Flint looked like he might murder someone.

"Bloody brilliant," he hissed.

He wasn't the only one who didn't like the set-up. Snape looked angrier than ever, and all the Slytherins in the stands were groaning their complaints.

"We're completely doomed," Mal muttered to herself. "Hey, watch it!"

Someone had pushed Malvora in the back. It was Pansy Parkinson.

"Pardon me, Melbarke," she smiled innocently.

"How is it that you always show up when I really don't want you around?" Malvora hissed.

"Ooh, testy," said Pansy. She turned her attention to the game. "I think we'll win, don't you? Since Draco is one of our Chasers."

Malvora didn't answer; Snape had just awarded Slytherin a penalty because a Weasley had hit a Bludger at him. Mal watched Harry carefully, who was circling the game like a hawk, looking for the Snitch.

"So, Melbarke," Pansy continued, much to Mal's dismay, "how on earth did you end up hanging out with Draco all the time, anyway?"

"Pansy, if I hear you mention Draco one more time, I'll push you completely off the stand," said Malvora as Snape awarded Slytherin another penalty for no reason at all. "Can't you see I'm watching the game?"

Pansy's face turned a shade of pink.

"Maybe Draco doesn't know about your family history, and that's why he puts up with you," she said.

Malvora tensed and Pansy grinned, seeing she'd hit a nerve. Not daring to take her eyes from the game, Mal said, "Not another word, Parkinson."

"You know, a lot of Slytherins wonder if you're really Pureblood at all," Pansy continued. "I don't think you deserve Draco's company."

"Pansy – one more word –" She suddenly sat up straight, gasping at the game.

Harry had gone into a spectacular dive, which drew gasps and cheers from the crowd. He streaked toward the ground like a bullet.

"You're just trying to make yourself look better," said Pansy, "by hanging around Draco and the famous Potter. Pathetic, really."

Malvora snapped. Before Pansy knew what was happening, Mal was on top of her, wrestling her to the ground. Both girls were completely unaware of what was happening on the Quidditch field.

Up in the air, Snape turned on his broomstick just in time to see something scarlet shoot past him, missing him by inches – the next second, Harry had pulled out of the dive, arm raised in triumph, the Snitch clasped in his hand.

The stands erupted; it had to be a record, no one could ever remember the Snitch being caught so quickly.

Harry jumped off his broom, a foot from the ground. He couldn't believe it. He'd done it – the game was over; it had barely lasted five minutes. As Slytherins came spilling onto the field, he saw Snape land nearby, white-faced and tight-lipped – then Harry felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up into Dumbledore's smiling face.

"Well done," said Dumbledore quietly, so that only Harry could hear. "Nice to see you haven't been brooding about that mirror . . . been keeping busy . . . excellent . . ."

Harry left the locker room alone some time later, to take his Nimbus Two Thousand back to the broomshed. He couldn't ever remember feeling happier. He'd really done something to be proud of now – no one could say he was just a famous name any more. The evening air had never smelled so sweet. He walked over the damp grass, reliving the last hour in his head, which was a happy blur: Slytherins running to praise him, Draco sneering in jealousy, and Malvora in the distance, waving happily with scratch marks on her face.

Harry had reached the shed. He leaned against the wooden door and looked up at Hogwarts, with its windows glowing red in the setting sun. Slytherin was assured the Championship cup. He'd done it. And Snape hadn't tried to kill him . . .

And speaking of Snape. . .

A hooded figure came swiftly down the front steps of the castle. Clearly not wanting to be seen, it walked as fast as possible toward the forbidden forest. Harry's victory faded from his mind as he watched. He recognized the figure's prowling walk. Snape, sneaking into the forest while everyone else was at dinner – what was going on?

Harry jumped back on his Nimbus Two Thousand and took off. Gliding silently over the castle, he saw Snape enter the forest at a run. He followed.

The trees were so thick he couldn't see where Snape had gone. He flew in circles, lower and lower, brushing the top branches of trees until he heard voices. He glided toward them and landed noiselessly in a towering beech tree.

He climbed carefully along one of the branches, holding tight to his broomstick, trying to see through the leaves.

Below, in a shadowy clearing, stood Snape, but he wasn't alone. Quirrell was there, too. Harry couldn't make out the look on his face, but he was stuttering worse than ever. Harry strained to catch what they were saying.

". . .d-don't know why you wanted t-t-to meet here of all p-places, Severus. . ."

"Oh, I thought we'd keep this private," said Snape, his voice icy. "Students aren't supposed to know about the Sorcerer's Stone, after all."

Harry leaned forward. Quirrell was mumbling something. Snape interrupted him.

"Have you found out how to get past that beast of Hagrid's yet?"

"B-but Severus, I –"

"You don't want me as your enemy, Quirrell," said Snape, taking a step toward him.

"I-I don't know what you – "

"You know perfectly well what I mean."

An owl hooted loudly, and Harry nearly fell out of the tree. He steadied himself in time to hear Snape say, " – your little bit of hocus-pocus. I'm waiting."

"B-but I d-d-don't –"

"Very well," Snape cut in. "We'll have another little chat soon, when you've had time to think things over and decided where your loyalties lie."

He threw his cloak over his head and strode out of the clearing. It was almost dark now, but Harry could see Quirrell, standing quite still as though he was petrified.

"Where were you?" Draco asked.

"Nice of you to finally join us," said Malvora. "We won the match and I got Pansy's diamond earrings. They look dashing with my coat, don't they? Don't worry, she's all right, just a little bruised. Come on, everyone's in the common room having a party, I stole some treats from the kitchens and stashed some away just for you."

"Never mind that now," said Harry breathlessly. "Let's find an empty room, you wait 'til you hear this. . ."

He made sure Peeves wasn't inside before shutting the door behind them, then he told them what he'd seen and heard.

"So we were right, it _is _the Sorcerer's Stone, and Snape's trying to force Quirrell to help him get it. He asked if he knew how to get past Fluffy – and he said something about Quirrell's 'hocus-pocus' – I reckon there are other things guarding the stone apart from Fluffy, loads of enchantments, probably, and Quirrell would have done some anti-Dark Arts spell that Snape needs to break through –"

"So, the Stone is only safe as long as Quirrell can stand up to Snape?" said Malvora with a raised eyebrow.

"Brilliant. We're completely doomed," said Draco.


	9. Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback

**Authors' Note: **:) Forgive the Americanization which changed the title of the book from the Philosopher's Stone to the Sorcerer's Stone.

And thanks to everyone who has been reviewing. Occasionally, we get a really bad review (like the one that said that the story is a fail etc.) but we don't mind as long as we know that there are people who continue to enjoy the fic. For you, we will continue to update and hope that you like our alterations. We'd like, just for a moment, to stress that we were never trying to _be _Rowling. Or to make a _perfect_ parallel of the actual book. This is but a humble fanfiction, after all.

Oh, and in regard to the lack of Draco which someone mentioned a while ago, we do apologize, but Draco and Harry are not as naturally inclined to be best friends as Harry and Ron were. We tend to agree that if we put them in the same room as each other too much, they'd end up completely hating one another. But don't worry, their friendship (though rockier than Harry's and Ron's) will have its moments. We implore you to keep in mind that since Harry is a Slytherin, the role of friendship in his life is not nearly as important as it was in the original stories, therefore, he, Draco, and Mal sometimes acts as rivals more than inseperable musketeers. In fact, in the Chamber of Secrets sequel, Harry spends a great deal of time completely alone and plotting, where in the original he was making a polyjuice potion with Ron and Hermione. Butterfly effect.

Thank you again, please enjoy, and don't be afraid to review.

* * *

Quirrell, however, must have been braver than they thought. In the weeks that followed he did seem to be getting paler and thinner, but it didn't look as though he'd cracked yet.

Every time they passed the third-floor corridor, Harry, Mal, and Draco would press their ears to the door to check that Fluffy was still growling inside. Snape was sweeping about in his usual bad temper, which surely meant that the Stone was still safe. Whenever Harry passed Quirrell these days he gave him an encouraging sort of smile, and Malvora had started telling people off for laughing at Quirrell's stutter.

Draco, however, had become twice as irritable as normal, and complained rather freely about how he didn't want to be involved in any of this. More often than not, Harry and Malvora completely ignored him. They had more important things to do than argue - like studying for the exams, since all the teachers had started piling on so much homework. The three of them spent most of their free time in the library, trying to get through the extra work.

"I'd have much more time to study if I wasn't worrying about three-headed dogs and Sorcerer's Stones," said Draco with a scowl.

Harry, who was looking up "Dittany" in _One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi, _didn't look up until he heard Malvora say, "Hagrid! I didn't know you read!"

Hagrid shuffled into view, hiding something behind his back. He looked very out of place in his moleskin overcoat.

"Jus' lookin'," he said, in a shifty voice that got their interest at once. "An' what're you lot up ter?" He looked suddenly suspicious. "Yer not still lookin' fer Nicolas Flamel, are yeh?"

"Oh no, we figured that out ages ago," said Mal proudly. "We even figured out what the dog's guarding, no problem."

"_Shhhh!" _Hagrid looked around quickly to see if anyone was listening. "Don' go shoutin' about it, what's the matter with yeh?"

"There are a few things we wanted to ask you, as a matter of fact," said Harry, "about what's guarding the Stone apart from Fluffy-"

"SHHHH!" said Hagrid again. "Listen – come an' see me later, I'm not promisin' I'll tell yeh anythin', mind, but don' go rabbitin' about it in here, students aren' s'pposed ter know. They'll think I've told yeh –"

"See you later, then," said Harry.

Hagrid shuffled off.

"He's up to something," said Malvora.

"What does it matter?" Draco asked exasperated. "I'm not going back to his hut, you can't make me."

"I'm going to see what section he was in," said Mal, who'd had enough of working. She came back a minute later with a pile of books in her arms and a huge grin on her face, she slammed the books on the table.

"_Dragons!" _she squeaked. "I've read half of these before: _Dragon Species of Great Britain and Ireland; From Eggs to Inferno, A Dragon Keeper's Guide. _That's a good one, that is –"

"Hagrid's always wanted a dragon, he told me so the first time I ever met him," said Harry.

"Everyone wants a dragon," stated Mal, matter-of-factly.

"But they're _illegal!_" said Draco. "Dragon breeding was outlawed by the Warlocks' Convention of 1709, everyone knows that. Muggles would panic if they saw dragons flying about everywhere. Besides, dragons can't be tamed. They're wild beasts."

"Rubbish, if you ask me," said Mal.

"But there aren't wild dragons in _Britain?_" said Harry.

"Yes there are!" said Mal, excitedly. "Common Welsh Green and Hebridean Blacks. And that's just if you're counting dragons and not the smaller breeds such as wyverns and –"

"The point is," Draco interrupted, "they're _illegal_."

When they knocked on the door of the gamekeeper's hut an hour later, they were surprised to see that all the curtains were closed. Hagrid called "Who is it?" before he let them in, and then shut the door quickly behind them.

It was stifling hot inside. Even though it was such a warm day, there was a blazing fire in the grate. Hagrid made them tea and offered them stoat sandwiches, which they refused.

"So – yeh wanted to ask me somethin'?"

"Yes," said Harry. There was no point beating around the bush. "We were wondering if you could tell us what's guarding the Sorcerer's Stone apart from Fluffy."

Hagrid frowned at him.

"O' course I can't," he said. "Number one, I don't know meself. Number two, yeh know too much already, so I wouldn' tell yeh if I could. That Stone's here for a good reason. It was almost stolen outta Gringotts – I s'ppose yeh've worked that out an' all? Beats me how yeh even know abou' Fluffy."

"Oh, Hagrid, you silly man. You can't pretend you don't at least know who's _done _the guarding of the stone. You're Hagrid! You know _everything _that goes on at Hogwarts," said Malvora in a warm, flattering voice. Hagrid's beard twitched and they could tell he was smiling. "It wouldn't do any harm to tell us _that. _We just wanted to know who Dumbledore could _possibly_ trust besides you to help him."

Hagrid's chest swelled at these last words. Harry and Draco beamed at Malvora.

"Well, I don' s'pose it could hurt ter tell yeh that . . . let's see . . . he borrowed Fluffy from me . . . then some o' the teachers did enchantments . . . Professor Sprout – Professor Flitwick – Professor McGonagall –" he ticked them off on his fingers, "Professor Quirrell – an' Dumbledore himself did somethin', o' course. Hang on, I've forgotten someone. Oh yeah, Professor Snape."

"_Snape?"_

"Yeah – yer not still on abou' that, are yeh? Look, Snape helped _protect _the Stone, he's not about ter steal it."

Harry knew Malvora and maybe Draco were thinking the same as he was. If Snape had been in on protecting the Stone, it must have been easy to find out how the other teachers had guarded it. He probably knew everything – except, it seemed, Quirrell's spell and how to get past Fluffy.

"You're the only one who knows how to get past Fluffy, aren't you, Hagrid?" said Harry anxiously. "And you wouldn't tell anyone, would you? Not even one of the teachers?"

"Not a soul knows except me an' Dumbledore," said Hagrid proudly.

"Well, that's something," Harry muttered to the others. "Hagrid, can we have a window open? I'm boiling."

"Can't, Harry, sorry," said Hagrid. Harry noticed him glace at the fire. Harry looked at it, too.

"Hagrid – what's _that_?"

But he already knew what it was. In the very heart of the fire, underneath the kettle, was a huge, black egg.

"Ah," said Hagrid, fiddling nervously with his beard, "That's – er . . ."

Malvora gasped and ran straight to the egg.

"It's a Norwegian Ridgeback egg!" she squealed. "But where did you get it? These things cost a fortune!"

"Won it," said Hagrid. "Las' night. I was down in the village havin' a few drinks an' got into a game o' cards with a stranger. Think he was quite glad ter get rid of it, ter be honest."

"But what are you going to do with it when it's hatched?" asked Mal.

"Well, I've been doin' some readin'," said Hagrid, pulling a large book from under his pillow. "Got this outta the library – _Dragon Breeding for Pleasure and Profit _– it's a bit outta date, o' course, but it's all in here. Keep the egg in the fire, 'cause their mothers breath on 'em, see, an' when it hatches, feed it on a bucket o' brandy mixed with chicken blood every half hour. An' see here – how ter recognize different eggs – yer friend's right, it is a Norwegian Ridgeback. They're rare, them."

He looked very pleased with himself, but Draco didn't.

"But they're _illegal_," he said.

But Hagrid wasn't listening. He was humming merrily as he stoked the fire.

So now they had something else to worry about: what might happen to Hagrid if anyone found out he was hiding an illegal dragon in his hut. It was hard enough convincing Draco to keep quiet about it, who was very much inclined to write a letter to his father about how Hogwarts had gone to the dogs, until Malvora promised to destroy his reputation if he said a word.

Then, one breakfast time, Hedwig brought Harry another note from Hagrid. He had written only two words: _It's hatching_.

Malvora wanted to skip Herbology and go straight down to the hut, but Draco was reluctant.

"Would you stop being such a baby about it?" Malvora snapped. "If you go, you'll at least be able to brag about watching a dragon hatching."

"I don't want anything to do with Hagrid or that disgusting creature," said Draco. "I won't be involved when Hagrid gets sacked for –"

"Shut up!" Harry whispered.

Pansy was just a few feet away and she had stopped dead to listen. How much had she heard? Harry didn't like the look on Parkinson's face at all.

Draco and Malvora argued all the way to Herbology and in the end, Draco agreed to run down to Hagrid's hut with the other two during morning break. When the bell sounded from the castle at the end of their lesson, the three of them dropped their trowels at once and hurried through the grounds to the edge of the forest. Hagrid greeted them, looking flushed and excited.

"It's nearly out." He ushered them inside.

The egg was lying on the table. There were deep cracks in it. Something was moving inside; a funny clicking noise was coming from it.

They all drew their chairs up to the table and watched with bated breath.

All at once there was a scraping noise and the egg split open. The baby dragon flopped onto the table. It wasn't exactly pretty; Harry thought it looked like a crumpled, black umbrella. Its spiny wings were huge compared to its skinny jet body, it had a long snout with wide nostrils, the stubs of horns and bulging, orange eyes.

It sneezed. A couple of sparks flew out of its snout.

"Isn't he _beautiful_?" Hagrid murmured. He reached a hand out to stroke the dragon's head. It snapped at his fingers, showing pointed fangs.

"Bless him, look, he knows his mommy!" said Hagrid.

Malvora was just as enthusiastic.

"Oh, Hagrid! I wish I had my own! What will you name him?"

Hagrid was about to answer when the color suddenly drained from his face – he leapt to his feet and ran to the window.

"What's the matter?"

"Someone was lookin' through the gap in the curtains – it's a kid – she's runnin' back up ter the school."

Harry bolted to the door and looked out. Even at a distance there was no mistaking her.

Pansy had seen the dragon.

It was shortly after this incident that Draco decided he wanted out of everything. He didn't want anything to do with the dragon and certainly nothing to do with the Sorcerer's Stone or Fluffy. Nothing could have infuriated Malvora more than this sudden declaration.

"You can't just back out now!" she yelled. "You'll tell on me and Harry!"

"And risk having you spoil my reputation?" he snapped. "No, thanks. I won't say a word about your stupid adventures as long as you swear to leave me out of them."

"I always knew you were a coward," Mal seethed. "All Malfoy's are alike."

Before Draco had the chance to retaliate, Mal stomped away in a huff.

She and Harry spent a fair deal of time in Hagrid's darkened hut, trying to reason with him. Draco's word was only as good as he was, and he wasn't the only one who knew about the dragon.

"Just let him go," Harry urged. "Set him free."

"I can't," said Hagrid. "He's too little. He'd die."

They looked at the dragon. It had grown three times in length in just a week. Smoke kept furling out of its nostrils. Hagrid hadn't been doing his gamekeeping duties because the dragon was keeping him so busy. There were empty brandy bottles and chicken feathers all over the floor.

"I've decided to call him Norbert," said Hagrid, looking at the dragon with misty eyes. "He really knows me now, watch. Norbert! Norbert! Where's Mommy?"

"Aw, how sweet! Can I be his godmother, Hagrid?" Malvora asked, jumping up and down.

"Hagrid," said Harry loudly, "give it two weeks and Norbert's going to be as long as your house. Parkinson could go to Dumbledore at any moment."

Hagrid bit his lip.

"I – I know I can't keep him forever, but I can't jus' dump him, I can't."

Malvora looked at Harry, determination in her eyes.

"We'll figure something out, Hagrid. I promise."

Draco had gone back to hanging round Crabbe, Goyle and worst of all, Pansy. Not a day went by when Mal didn't say something cruel to any of them, though each time she did, either Pansy or Draco would look at her as if threatening to tell about Norbert if she kept at it.

"I really can't stand him," Mal complained loudly at breakfast one morning after seeing Draco eating and laughing at something with his group.

"Don't worry about him," said Harry. "We need to be thinking about how to deal with Norbert."

"I know," said Malvora angrily. She sat for a moment in silence. Suddenly, her eyes lit up. "I've got it!"

Before Harry could ask any questions, she'd stood from the table, and marched out of the Great Hall.

Later that night, Harry found her in the common room, writing something with furrowed brows. Harry sat next to her, curiously. He picked up a piece of parchment from the ground near her feet. It was the Potions homework of one Ronald Weasley.

"The Weasley's brother, Charlie, works with dragons in Romania," she explained as she wrote. "I remember because I read about it in my extensive dragon research. So, Ron Weasley is about to send a letter to his brother, asking for help."

"But why would a Weasley help us?" asked Harry, not understanding.

Malvora finished her last sentence and then grinned widely at Harry. She handed the note to him. It was written to Charlie Weasley, from Ron Weasley, with handwriting that exactly matched the Weasley boy's handwriting. Malvora had forged the letter – and rather convincingly so. It asked if Charlie would be willing to take Norbert and put him back in the wild.

"Excellent, Mal!" said Harry as she borrowed Hedwig and attached the note to her claw.

"Listen, Hedwig," she said, "Charlie will return a letter addressed to Ronald Weasley, but I want you to bring it straight to me, not to Ron, you understand?"

Hedwig ruffled her feathers impatiently and Malvora opened the secret passageway to allow her out.

The following week dragged by. Wednesday night found Malvora and Harry sitting alone in the common room, long after everyone else had gone to bed. The clock on the wall had just chimed midnight when a scratching sound reached their ears. Camo was pacing back and forth at the secret wall and when it opened, Hedwig flew inside, barely missing Camo's outstretched claws.

"It's Hedwig!" said Harry, hurrying to let her in. "She'll have Charlie's answer!"

They put their heads together to read the note.

Dear Ron,

How are you? Thanks for the letter – I'd be glad to take the Norwegian Ridgeback, but it won't be easy getting him here. I think the best way will be to send him over with some friends of mine who are coming to visit me next week. Trouble is, they mustn't be seen carrying an illegal dragon.  
Could you get the Ridgeback up the tallest tower at Midnight on Saturday? They can meet you there and take him away while it's still dark.  
Send me an answer as soon as possible.

Love,

Charlie

They looked at one another.

"We've got the Invisibility Cloak," said harry. "it shouldn't be too difficult – I think the cloak's big enough to cover the two of us and Norbert."

There was a hitch. The next morning, Draco demanded Malvora return the books she'd "borrowed" from him, and she was in such a rage that she threw the books at him, tried to trip Pansy, and was at last dragged by Harry out of the common room.

"He's a traitor!" she howled. "We trusted him and he's nothing but a coward!"

"Malvora, calm down, we don't need Draco for any of this," Harry reasoned.

"I hate him! He'll turn us in and Norbert will be executed and it will be all my fault! I'm such an idiot!" she slumped against the wall in defeat.

"Mal, you haven't done anything wrong," Harry said.

"Oh yes I have," she moaned. "I left Charlie's letter in one of those books I threw at him. Now, he and Pansy will know exactly where to find us on Saturday. Norbert will be executed and Hagrid sacked and us expelled."

Harry sat down next to her and said, "It's too late to change the plan now. We haven't got time to send Charlie another owl, and this could be our last chance to get rid of Norbert. We'll have to risk it. And we _have _got the Invisibility Cloak. Even if Draco and Pansy do want to turn us in, which I doubt, they won't be able to find us."

Later, they found Fang the boarhound sitting outside with a bandaged tail when they went to tell Hagrid, who opened a window to talk to them.

"I won't let you in," he puffed. "Norbert's at a tricky stage – nothin' I can't handle."

When they told him about Charlie's letter, his eyes filled with tears, although it might have been because Norbert had just bitten him on the leg.

"Aargh! It's all right, he only got my boot – jus' playin' – he's only a baby, after all."

The baby banged its tail on the wall, making the windows rattle. Harry and Malvora walked back to the castle, Harry feeling that Saturday couldn't come quickly enough, and Mal in better spirits after having been near Norbert.

Harry would have felt sorry for Hagrid when the time came for him to say good-bye to Norbert if he hadn't been so worried about what he and Mal had to do. It was a very dark, cloudy night, and they were a bit late arriving at Hagrid's hut because they'd had to wait for Peeves to get out of their way in the entrance hall, where he'd been playing tennis against the wall.

Hagrid had Norbert packed and ready in a large crate.

"He's got lots o' rats an' some brandy fer the journey," said Hagrid in a muffled voice. "An' I've packed his teddy bear in case he gets lonely."

From inside the crate came ripping noises that sounded to Harry as though the teddy was having his head torn off.

"Bye-bye, Norbert!" Hagrid sobbed, as Harry and Malvora covered the crate with the Invisibility Cloak and stepped underneath it themselves. "Mommy will never forget you!"

How they managed to get the crate back up to the castle, they never knew. Midnight ticked nearer as they heaved Norbert up the marble staircase in the entrance hall and along the dark corridors. Up another staircase, then another – even one of Harry's shortcuts didn't make the work much easier.

"Nearly there!" Harry panted as they reached the corridor beneath the tallest tower.

Then a sudden movement ahead of them made them almost drop the crate. Forgetting that they were already invisible, they shrank into the shadows, staring at the dark outlines of two people grappling with each other ten feet away. A lamp flared.

Professor McGonagall, in a tartan bathrobe and a hair net, had Draco by the ear.

"Detention!" she shouted. "And twenty points from Slytherin! Wandering around in the middle of the night, how _dare _you –"

"But Professor, I –"

"That's enough, Malfoy! I shall see Professor Snape about you!"

The steep spiral staircase was no easier after that. Not until they'd stepped out into the cold night air did they throw off the cloak, glad to be able to breathe properly again. Malvora cursed, loudly.

"That good for nothing rat was trying to catch us!" she spat.

"It seems that way," Harry agreed.

While they fumed about Draco, they waited, Norbert thrashing about in his crate. About ten minutes later, four broomsticks came swooping down out of the darkness.

Charlie's friends were a cheery lot. They showed harry and Malvora the harness they'd rigged up, so they could suspend Norbert between them. They all helped buckle Norbert safely into it and then Harry and Mal shook hands with the others and thanked them very much.

Malvora was teary-eyed as Norbert was going . . . going . . ._gone_.

The slipped back down the spiral staircase, Harry feeling as light as a feather, but Malvora in perhaps the foulest mood ever.

"First, Draco tries to snitch on us, then we lose the only dragon I've ever loved. I don't see how this day could get any worse."

It could get much worse. The proof of that was waiting at the foot of the stairs. As they stepped into the corridor, Filch's face loomed suddenly out of the darkness.

"Well, well, well," he whispered, "we _are _in trouble."

They'd left the Invisibility Cloak on the top of the tower.


	10. The Forbidden Forest

Now things couldn't have been worse.

Filch took them down to Professor Snape's office in the dungeons, where they sat and waited without saying a word to each other. Excuses, alibis, and wild cover-up stories chased each other around Harry's brain, each more feeble than the last. He couldn't see how they were going to get out of trouble this time. They were cornered. And worse, with Snape. How could they have been so stupid as to forget the cloak? There was no reason on earth Snape would accept for their being out of bed and creeping around the school in the dead of night, let alone being up the Tallest Astronomy Tower, which was out-of-bounds except for classes. Add Norbert and the Invisibility Cloak, and they might as well be packing their bags already.

Had Harry thought that things couldn't have been worse? He was wrong. When Professor Snape appeared, he was leading Pansy.

"-and that's why they were up there," said Pansy.

"Sit down, Miss Parkinson," Snape commanded. Pansy sat down at once.

Snape looked more likely to breathe fire than Norbert as he loomed over the three of them.

"It is one o'clock in the morning," he said. "What feeble excuse could you possibly have for wandering to the Astronomy Tower?"

"I told you, Professor," said Pansy, "they were trying to get rid of the dra-"

"Parkinson, do not speak out of turn," Snape snapped. He turned his gaze to Harry. "Potter, are you aware of the punishments for knowingly breaking Hogwarts rules?" he drawled. "Did you consider them before such willful disobedience?"

Harry didn't know what to say. Malvora's head was hanging and she refused to meet anyone's eyes.

"You are a disgrace to this House," said Snape. "I have half the mind to expel the three of you."

"What about Draco?" asked Mal. "He was out of bed, too!"

"His punishment is none of your concern, Miss Melbarke," said Snape. He stood straight and paced back and forth. Harry couldn't help but notice how worn he looked. It must have been from the effort of trying to get the Sorcerer's Stone.

"I take no pleasure from docking points from my own House," Snape said after a long moment, "but there is no excuse for such blatant disrespect of the rules. Twenty five points from Miss Melbarke."

Harry waited. Twenty-five points was nothing. Snape couldn't be finished yet.

"And seventy-five points from Mr. Potter."

"_What?_"

"You heard me, Potter," Snape snapped. "I'm sure this entire scheme was your idea, after all. Now, when the Slytherins start to ask why we've lost the lead for the House Cup, _you _will be held accountable."

"What about Pansy!" snapped Malvora. "Harry and I weren't the only ones sneaking around!"

"Do you ever mind your own business, Miss Melbarke?" Snape asked, silkily. "The three of you will also be receiving detentions. Now, get out."

A hundred points lost. That put Slytherin in third place. In one night, they'd ruined any chances of Slytherin holding the House Cup for the eighth year in a row. Harry felt as though the bottom had dropped out of his stomach. How could they make up for this?

Harry didn't sleep all night. Gryffindor was in the lead for the House Cup. What would happen when the rest of Slytherin found out about what they'd done?

At first, Slytherins passing the giant hourglass that recorded the House points the next day thought there'd been a mistake. How could they suddenly have a hundred points fewer than yesterday? And then the story started to spread: Harry Potter, the famous Harry Potter, their hero of two Quidditch matches, had lost them all those points, him and another stupid first year.

From being one of the most popular and admired people at the school, Harry was suddenly the most hated. Not a single Slytherin wanted anything to do with him. They pointed and didn't trouble to lower their voices as they insulted him. On the other hand, the three other Houses clapped as he walked past them, whistling and cheering. They were all happy to see Slytherin lose, which only made his own House hate him that much more. It was like salt in his wounds, every time a Gryffindor patted him on the back or said, "Thanks Potter, we owe you one!"

Only Malvora stood by him.

"It's just a stupid Cup, anyway. So we lost it, one out of the seven years we'll be going to Hogwarts. Big deal."

Harry had a much harder time looking at the big picture. He was sure that his House would never forgive him for losing all those points in one go, as long as he went to Hogwarts.

It was a bit late to repair the damage, but Harry swore to himself not to meddle in things that weren't his business from now on. He'd had it with sneaking around and spying. He felt so ashamed of himself that he went to Flint and offered to resign from the Quidditch team.

_"RESIGN?"_ Flint thundered. "Are you mental? If you quit, we'll never get the Cup back!"

But even Quidditch had lost its fun. The rest of the team, including Draco, wouldn't speak to Harry during practice, and if they had to speak about him, they called him "the Seeker."

Malvora wouldn't have admitted it, but she was suffering too. She didn't have as bad a time, because she wasn't as well-known, but people had started to insult her. This was probably due to Pansy, who was the only Slytherin in good spirits these days, who liked to openly wonder about Malvora's Pureblood lineage, until almost everyone was convinced that her line was tainted. Usually, Malvora would have threatened anyone who dared insult her family, but when it was the entire House, she couldn't do much but take it.

Then, there was Draco. No one besides Harry and Malvora seemed to know that he'd been wandering around that night, too. He kept his distance from them. Well, he kept his distance from everyone, mostly. Perhaps it was shame for not being able to catch Harry and Mal with the dragon. Whatever it was, he was keeping his head down.

Harry was almost glad that the exams weren't far away. All the studying he had to do kept his mind off his misery. He kept to himself, working late into the night, trying to remember the ingredients in complicated potions, learn charms and spells by heart, memorize the dates of magical discoveries and goblin rebellions.

Then, about a week before the exams were due to start, Harry's new resolution not to interfere in anything that didn't concern him was put to an unexpected test. Walking back from the library on his own one afternoon, he heard somebody whimpering from a classroom up ahead. As he drew closer, he heard Quirrell's voice.

"No – no – not again, please –"

It sounded as though someone was threatening him. Harry moved closer.

"All right – all right –" he heard Quirrell sob.

Next second, Quirrell came hurrying out of the classroom straightening his turban. He was pale and looked as though he was about to cry. He strode out of sight; Harry didn't think Quirrell had even noticed him. He waited until Quirrell's footsteps had disappeared, then peered into the classroom. It was empty, but a door stood ajar at the other end. Harry was halfway toward it before he remembered what he'd promised himself about not meddling.

All the same, he'd have gambled twelve Sorcerer's Stones that Snape had just left the room, and from what Harry had just heard, Snape would be walking with a new spring in his step – Quirrell seemed to have given in at last.

Harry went back to the library, where Malvora had fallen asleep over her Astronomy book. Harry shook her awake and told her what he'd heard.

"Snape knows how to get past Quirrell's spell, now," said Harry.

"He's still got to figure out how to get past Fluffy," said Mal.

"He could have already figured that out," said Harry, looking up at the thousands of books surrounding them. "There are probably books here that could tell you how to get past an giant three headed dog."

"So, what do we do?" asked Malvora, the light of adventure kindling in her eyes.

"Nothing," said Harry flatly. "No more poking around. We've gotten in enough trouble already."

He pulled a map of Jupiter toward him and started to learn the names of its moons.

The following morning, notes were delivered to Harry, Malvora, Pansy, and Draco at the breakfast table. They were all the same.

_Your detention will take place at eleven o' clock tonight. Meet Mr. Filch in the entrance hall._

_Professor S. Snape_

Harry had forgotten they still had detention to do in the furor over the points they'd lost. He looked at Malvora. She didn't say a word.

At eleven o'clock that night, they went up to entrance hall with Draco and Pansy, though they walked a distance ahead of them. Filch was already there.

"Follow me," he said, lighting a lamp and leading them outside.

"I bet you'll think twice about breaking a school rule again, won't you, eh?" he said, leering at them. "Oh yes . . . hard work and pain are the best teachers if you ask me . . . It's just a pity they let the old punishments die out . . . hang you by your wrists from the ceiling for a few days, I've got the chains still in my office, keep 'em well oiled in case they're ever needed… Right, off we go, and don't think of running off, now, it'll be worse for you if you do."

They marched off across the dark grounds. Pansy kept whimpering. Harry wondered what their punishment was going to be. It must be something really horrible, or Filch wouldn't be sounding so delighted.

The moon was bright, but clouds scudding across it kept throwing them into darkness. Ahead, Harry could see the lighted windows of Hagrid's hut. Then they heard a distant shout.

"Is that you, Filch? Hurry up, I want ter get started."

Harry's heart rose; if they were going to be working with Hagrid it wouldn't be so bad. His relief must have shown in his face, because Filch said, "I suppose you think you'll be enjoying yourself with that oaf? Well, think again, boy – it's into the forest you're going and I'm much mistaken if you'll all come out in one piece."

At this Pansy squeaked and Draco stopped dead in his tracks.

"The forest?" he repeated, and he didn't sound quite as cool as usual. "We can't go in there at night – there's all sorts of things in there – werewolves, I heard."

"Werewolves are the least of your troubles," said Malvora, glaring coldly at him. She still held a grudge since he had betrayed them and then tried to turn them in at the Astronomy Tower.

"Should've thought of them werewolves before you got in trouble, shouldn't you?" said Filch, gleefully.

Hagrid came striding toward them out of the dark, Fang at his heel. He was carrying his large crossbow, and a quiver of arrows hung over his shoulder.

"Abou' time," he said. "I bin waitin' fer half an hour already. All right, Harry, Malvora?"

"I wouldn't be too friendly to them, Hagrid," said Filch coldly, "they're here to be punished, after all."

"That's why yer late, is it?" said Hagrid, frowning at Filch. "Bin lecturin' them, eh? 'Snot your place ter do that. Yeh've done yer bit, I'll take over from here."

"I'll be back at dawn," said Filch, "for what's left of them," he added nastily, and he turned and started back toward the castle, his lamp bobbing away in the darkness.

Draco now turned to Hagrid.

"I'm not going in that forest," he said, and Malvora rolled her eyes.

"Yeh are if yeh want ter stay at Hogwarts," said Hagrid fiercely. "Yeh've done wrong an' now yeh've got ter pay fer it."

Mal stuck her tongue out at Draco. He ignored her.

"But this is servant stuff, it's not for students to do. I thought we'd be copying lines or something, if my father knew I was doing this he'd –"

"- tell yer that's how it is at Hogwarts," Hagrid growled. "Copyin' lines! What good's that ter anyone? Yeh'll do summat useful or yeh'll get out. If yeh think yer father'd rather you were expelled, then get back off ter the castle an' pack. Go on!"

Draco didn't move. He looked at Hagrid furiously, glanced at Harry and Malvora, and dropped his gaze.

"Right then," said Hagrid, "now, listen carefully, 'cause it's dangerous what we're gonna do tonight, an' I don't want no one takin' risks. Follow me over here a moment."

He led them to the very edge of the forest. Holding his lamp up high, he pointed down a narrow, winding earth track that disappeared into the thick black trees. A light breeze lifted their hairs as they looked into the forest.

"Look there," said Hagrid, "see that stuff shinin' on the ground? Silvery stuff? That's unicorn blood. There's a unicorn in there bin hurt badly by summat. This is the second time in a week. I found one dead last Wednesday. We're gonna try an' find the poor thing. We might have ter put it out of its misery."

"But what if the thing that hurt the unicorn finds us?" said Pansy, shivering.

"There's nothin' that lives in the forest that'll hurt yeh if yer with me or Fang," said Hagrid. "An' keep ter the path. Right, now, we're gonna split inter two parties an' follow the trail in diff'rent directions. There's blood all over the place, it must've bin staggerin' around since last night at least."

"I want Fang," said Draco quickly, looking at Fang's long teeth.

"All right, but I warn yeh, he's a coward," said Hagrid. "So me, Harry, and Pansy'll go one way an' Draco, Malvora, an' Fang'll go the other. Now, if any of us finds the unicorn, we'll send up green sparks, right? Get yer wands out an' practice now – that's it – an' if anyone gets in trouble, send up red sparks, an' we'll all come an' find yeh – so, be careful – let's go."

The forest was black and silent. A little way into it they reached a fork in the earth path, and Harry, Pansy, and Hagrid took the left path while Draco, Mal, and Fang took the right.

They walked in silence, their eyes on the ground. Every now and then a ray of moonlight through the branches above lit a spot of silver-blue blood on the fallen leaves.

Harry saw that Hagrid looked very worried.

"_Could _a werewolf be killing the unicorns?" Harry asked.

"Not fast enough," said Hagrid. "It's not easy ter catch a unicorn, they're powerful magic creatures. I never knew one ter be hurt before."

They walked past a mossy tree stump. Harry could hear running water; there must be a stream somewhere close by. There were still spots of unicorn blood here and there along the winding path.

"You all right, Pansy?" Hagrid whispered. "Don' worry, it can't've gone far if it's this badly hurt, an' then we'll be able ter – GET BEHIND THAT TREE!"

Hagrid seized Harry and Pansy and hoisted them off the path behind a towering oak. He pulled out an arrow and fitted it into his crossbow, raising it, ready to fire. The three of them listened. Something was slithering over dead leaves nearby: it sounded like a cloak trailing along the ground. Hagrid was squinting up the dark path, but after a few seconds, the sound faded away.

"I knew it," he murmured. "There's summat in her that shouldn' be."

"A werewolf?" Harry suggested.

"That wasn' no werewolf an' it wasn' no unicorn, neither," said Hagrid grimly. "Right, follow me, but careful, now."

They walked more slowly, ears straining for the faintest sound. Suddenly, in a clearing ahead, something definitely moved.

"Who's there?" Hagrid called. "Show yerself – I'm armed!"

And into the clearing came – was it a man, or a horse? To the waist, a man, with red hair and beard, but below that was a horse's gleaming chestnut body with a long, reddish tail. Pansy yelped and Harry's jaw dropped.

"Oh, it's you, Ronan," said Hagrid in relief. "How are yeh?"

He walked forward and shook the centaur's hand.

"Good evening to you, Hagrid," said Ronan. He had a deep, sorrowful voice. "Were you going to shoot me?"

"Can't be too careful, Ronan," said Hagrid, patting his crossbow. "There's summat bad loose in the forest. This is Harry Potter an' Pansy Parkinson, by the way. Students up at the school. An' this is Ronan, you two. He's a centaur."

"He's horrifying," said Pansy faintly.

"Good evening," said Ronan. "Students, are you? And do you learn much, up at the school?"

"Erm –"

Pansy nodded, her whole body shaking.

"Well, that's something." Ronan sighed. He flung back his head and stared at the sky. "Mars is bright tonight."

"Yeah," said Hagrid, glancing up, too. "Listen, I'm glad we've run inter yeh, Ronan, 'cause there's a unicorn bin hurt – you seen anythin'?"

Ronan didn't answer immediately. He stared unblinkingly upward, then sighed again.

"Always the innocent are the first victims," he said. "So it had been for ages past, so it is now."

"Yeah," said Hagrid, "but have yeh seen anythin', Ronan? Anythin' unusual?"

"Mars is bright tonight," Ronan repeated, while Hagrid watched him impatiently. "Unusually bright."

"Yeah, but I was meanin' anythin' unusual a bit nearer home," said Hagrid. "So yeh haven't noticed anythin' strange?"

Yet again, Ronan took a while to answer. At last, he said, "The forest hides many secrets."

A movement in the trees behind Ronan made Hagrid raise his bow again, but it was only a second centaur, black-haired and bodied and wilder-looking than Ronan.

"Hullo, Bane," said Hagrid. "All right?"

"Good evening, Hagrid, I hope you are well?"

"Well enough. Look, I've jus' bin askin' Ronan, you seen anythin' odd in here lately? There's a unicorn injured – would yeh know anythin' about it?"

Bane walked over to stand next to Ronan. He looked skyward.

"Mars is bright tonight," he said simply.

"We've heard," said Hagrid grumpily. "Well, if either of you do see anythin', let me know, won't yeh? We'll be off, then."

Harry and Pansy followed him out of the clearing, staring over their shoulders at Ronan and Bane until the trees blocked their view.

"Never," said Hagrid irritably, "try an' get a straight answer out of a centaur. Ruddy stargazers. Not interested in anythin' closer'n the moon."

"How many are there in here?" asked Pansy.

"Oh, a fair few . . . Keep themselves to themselves mostly, but they're good enough about turnin' up if ever I want a word. They're deep, mind, centaurs . . . they know things . . . jus' don' let on much."

"Do you think that was a centaur we heard earlier?" said Harry.

"Did that sound like hooves to you? Nah, if yeh ask me, that was what's bin killin' the unicorns – never heard anythin' like it before."

They walked on through the dense, dark trees. Harry kept looking nervously over his shoulder. He had the nasty feeling they were being watched. He was very glad they had Hagrid and his crossbow with them. He had just passed a bend in the path when Pansy screamed again.

"Hagrid! Look! Red sparks, Draco's in trouble!"

"You two wait here!" Hagrid shouted. "Stay on the path, I'll come back for yeh!"

They heard him crashing away through the undergrowth and stood looking at each other, very scared, until they couldn't hear anything but the rustling of leaves around them.

"You don't think he's hurt, do you?" whispered Pansy.

"Hagrid will be fine –"

"No, not Hagrid! Draco!"

"I don't know . . ." Malvora and Draco, his two closest friends when it suited… It would be his fault if something happened to them. It was Harry who first wanted to start meddling in everything.

The minutes dragged by. Their ears seemed sharper than usual. Harry seemed to be picking up ever sigh of the wind, every cracking twig. What was going on? Where were the others?

At last, a great crunching noise announced Hagrid's return. Draco, Malvora, and Fang were with him. Hagrid was fuming. Malvora, it seemed, had purposely shot up the red sparks because she was sick of traveling with Draco. They had obviously been in a huge argument. Malvora looked even angrier than Hagrid.

"I want to change groups," she said bluntly.

"We'll be lucky ter catch anythin' now, with the racket you two were makin'. Right, Malvora, you stay with me an' Pansy, Harry, you go with Fang an' Draco. I'm sorry," Hagrid added in a whisper to Harry, "but I can't put Draco and Pansy together, they're too scared, it'd be even worse."

"I'd rather be stuck with Parkinson, anyway," Malvora snapped at Draco before folding her arms and turning the other way.

So Harry set off into the heart of the forest with Draco and Fang. They walked for nearly a half an hour, deeper and deeper into the forest, until the path became almost impossible to follow because the trees were so thick. He made a point not to say anything to Draco, who looked more downcast than ever. It was Draco who spoke first.

"I wasn't trying to turn you in that night at the tower," he said quietly, while they ducked under a low hanging branch. Harry still ignored him.

"I didn't even want to abandon you when we found out about the dra- Norbert," Draco added. "It was Pansy. After she saw us in Hagrid's hut with Norbert, she told me she'd tell on us all unless I stopped hanging around you. She said, as long as I spent time with her, she wouldn't try and get the two of you caught."

Harry listened, quietly.

"Then, she was borrowing my Charms book one day and she found the letter from the Weasley brother and tried to hide it from me. I heard her telling Bulstrode that she going to get you and Malvora expelled because she knew something you were planning to do."

"Then she'd have you all to herself," said Harry, rolling his eyes.

"Yes, but I found the note and I was trying to get to you that night to warn you about Pansy, and I got caught by McGonagall," Draco was very quiet when he said this. It seemed a real difficulty for him to admit he had been trying to be noble.

"That's what you were trying to tell Mal, earlier, wasn't it?" asked Harry, squeezing between two trees.

"She didn't believe a word of it."

Harry wasn't quite sure if he did, either. At any rate, it was at least a brilliantly crafted lie.

"Does it seem like the blood is getting thicker?"

There were splashes on the roots of a tree, as though the poor creature had been thrashing around in pain close by. Harry could see a clearing ahead, through the tangled branches of an ancient oak.

"Look –" he murmured, holding out his arm to stop Draco.

Something bright white was gleaming on the ground. They inched closer.

It was the unicorn all right, and it was dead. Harry had never seen anything so beautiful and sad. Its long, slender legs were stuck out at odd angles where it had fallen and its mane was spread pearly-white on the dark leaves.

Harry had taken one step toward it when a slithering sound made him freeze where he stood. A bush on the edge of the clearing quivered . . . Then, out of the shadows, a hooded figure came crawling across the ground like some stalking beast. Harry, Draco, and Fang stood transfixed. The cloaked figure reached the unicorn, lowered its head over the wound in the animal's side, and began to drink its blood.

"AAAAAAAAAAARGH"

Draco let out a terrible scream and bolted – so did Fang. The hooded figure raised its head and looked right at Harry – unicorn blood was dribbling down its front. It got to its feet and came swiftly toward Harry – he couldn't move for fear.

Then a pain like he'd never felt before pierced his head; it was as though his scar were on fire. Half blinded, he staggered backward. He heard hooves behind him, galloping, and something jumped clean over Harry, charging at the figure.

The pain in Harry's head was so bad he fell to his knees. It took a minute or two to pass. When he looked up, the figure had gone. A centaur was standing over him, not Ronan or Bane; this one looked younger; he had white-blond hair and a palomino body.

"Are you all right?" said the centaur, pulling Harry to his feet.

"Yes – thank you – what _was _that?"

The centaur did not answer. He had astonishingly blue eyes, like pale sapphires. He looked carefully at Harry, his eyes lingering on the scar that stood out, livid, on Harry's forehead.

"You are the Potter boy," he said. "You had better get back to Hagrid. The forest is not safe at this time – especially for you. Can you ride? It will be quicker this way.

"My name is Firenze," he added, as he lowered himself on to his front legs so that Harry could clamber onto his back.

There was suddenly a sound of more galloping from the other sides of the clearing. Ronan and Bane came bursting through the trees, their flanks heaving and sweaty.

"Firenze!" Bane thundered. "What are you doing? You have a human on your back! Have you no shame? Are you a common mule?"

"Do you realize who this is?" said Firenze. "This is the Potter boy. The quicker he leaves the forest, the better."

"What have you been telling him?" growled Bane. "Remember, Firenze, we are sworn not to set ourselves against the heavens. Have we not read what is to come in the movement of the planets?"

Ronan pawed the ground nervously. "I'm sure Firenze thought he was acting for the best," he said in his gloomy voice.

Bane kicked back his legs in anger.

"For the best! What is that to do with us? Centaurs are concerned with what has been foretold! It is not our business to run around like donkeys after stray humans in the forest!"

Firenze suddenly reared on to his hind legs in anger, so that Harry had to grab his shoulders to stay on.

"Do you not see that unicorn?" Firenze bellowed at Bane. "Do you not understand why it was killed? Or have the planets not let you in on that secret? I set myself against what is lurking in this forest, Bane, yes, with humans alongside me if I must."

And Firenze whisked around; with Harry clutching on as best he could, they plunged off into the trees, leaving Ronan and Bane behind them. Harry didn't have a clue what was going on.

"Why's Bane so angry?" he asked. "What was the thing you saved me from, anyway?" Firenze slowed to a walk, warned Harry to keep his head bowed in case of low-hanging branches, but did not answer Harry's question. They made their way through the trees in silence for so long that Harry thought Firenze didn't want to talk to him anymore. They were passing through a particularly dense patch of trees, however, when Firenze suddenly stopped.

"Harry Potter, do you know what unicorn blood is used for?"

"No," said Harry, startled by the odd question. "We've only used the horn and tail in potions."

"That is because it is a monstrous thing, to slay a unicorn," said Firenze. "Only one who has nothing to lose, and everything to gain, would commit such a crime. The blood of a unicorn will keep you alive, even if you are an inch from death, but at a terrible price. You have slain something pure and defenseless to save yourself, and you will have but a half-life, a cursed life, from the moment the blood touches your lips."

Harry stared at the back of Firenze's head, which was dappled silver in the moonlight.

"But who'd be that desperate?" he wondered aloud. "If you're going to be cursed forever, death's better, isn't it?"

"It is," Firenze agreed, "unless all you need is to stay alive long enough to drink something else – something that will bring you back to full strength and power – something that will mean you can never die. Mr. Potter, do you know what is hidden in the school at this very moment?"

"The Sorcerer's Stone! Of course – the Elixir of Life! But I don't understand who –"

"Can you think of nobody who has waited many years to return to power, who has clung to life, awaiting their chance?"

It was as though an iron fist had clenched suddenly around Harry's heart. Over the rustling of the trees, he seemed to hear once more what Hagrid had told him on the night they had met: "Some say he died. Codswallop, in my opinion. Dunno if he had enough human left in him to die."

"Do you mean," Harry croaked, "that was _Vol_-"

"Harry! Are you all right?"

Malvora was running toward them down the path, Hagrid puffing along behind her.

"I'm fine," said Harry, hardly knowing what he was saying. "The unicorn's dead, Hagrid, it's in that clearing back there."

"This is where I leave you," Firenze murmured as Hagrid hurried off to examine the unicorn. "You are safe now."

Harry slid off his back.

"Good luck, Harry Potter," said Firenze. "The planets have been read wrongly before now, even by centaurs. I hope this is one of those times."  
He turned and cantered back into the depths of the forest, leaving Harry shivering behind him.

Draco was waiting for them back in the common room. He was sitting on the sofa, petting Camo, his face pale and tense. He stood when he saw them, ignoring Camo's protests.

"Harry, Malvora, I –"

"Never mind that," said Harry, waving him off.

Harry immediately began to tell him and Malvora what had happened in the forest.

He couldn't sit down. He paced up and down in front of the fire. He was still shaking.

"Snape wants the Stone for Voldemort . . . and Voldemort's waiting in the forest . . . and all this time we thought Snape just wanted to get rich . . ."

"Don't say the name!" said Draco in a terrified whisper, as if he thought Voldemort could hear them.

Harry wasn't listening.

"Firenze saved me, but he shouldn't have done so . . . Bane was furious . . . he was talking about interfering with what the planets say is going to happen . . . They must show that Voldemort's coming back . . . Bane thinks Firenze should have let Voldemort kill me . . . I suppose that's written in the stars as well."

"_Stop saying his name!_" Draco hissed.

"So all I've got to wait for now is Snape to steal the Stone," Harry went on feverishly, "then Voldemort will be able to come and finish me off . . . Well, I suppose Bane'll be happy."

Malvora and Draco both looked very frightened.

"But Dumbledore is the only wizard You-Know-Who was ever afraid of," said Draco with a shaking voice. "With him around, You-Know-Who won't be able to do anything, right? Besides, those centaurs are mad. Fortune-telling is complete nonsense."

The sky had turned light before they stopped talking. They went to bed exhausted, their throats sore. But the night's surprises weren't over.

When Harry pulled back his sheets, he found his Invisibility Cloak folded neatly underneath them. There was a note pinned to it:

_Just in case._


	11. Through the Trapdoor

**Author's Note: **In regard to Azrael's review: Your review was very well worded and thorough and we, by no stretch of the imagination, saw it as a "bad" review. On the contrary, this is exactly the type of criticism I, as the author, happily receive. I would like to start by thanking you and assuring you that I feel nothing but the greatest appreciation and respect for your critique.

I do understand the feeling that this fic parallels the original story, perhaps too much. I have often wondered if I could have altered more of it. Looking back, however, I feel that, as it is my first fic in this line, I was right to keep it as close to home as possible. This is for two reasons: 1) As I have mentioned the snowball effect, I wanted to incorporate minor changes in order to give a larger comparison in fics to come. 2) This, being my first fic of this nature, is also a bit of an experiment. As I write, I learn what I should and should not do and how much room I have to work with in the future. I can only pray that my readers have the patience and kindness to explore these possibilities with me.

As for Harry helping Hagrid with Norbert, you are one hundred percent correct. Harry's personality has been altered slightly (which I planned, seeing as he is in Slytherin and therefore has a different lense through which to perceive life), but I failed to even consider how this alteration made Harry's assisting of Hagrid seem out of character in my fic. Admittedly, I was far more focused on the benefits the scene had to my fic, including Malvora's love for dragons, and the opportunity to show just how upset Draco was about the entire adventure. I seem to have forgotten that Harry is the focus of this story, and I will pay much more attention to him in the future. Thank you, heartily, for helping me realize this.

As far as your praise goes, I am humbled and glad to hear that Draco has been in character, and that Malvora is an appealing enough OC. As for the almost immaculate grammar, you have my partner in crime, Rhamiel, to thank for that. He checks, not just my grammar, but my ideas as well.

In essence, thank you Azrael, and I do not blame you for not wanting to read this fic. I would be most honored, however, if you choose to give the sequel a glance over when it is published. Perhaps you will find more substance there.

Finally, my loyal readers, thank you for having read thus far, and I hope that you will continue to read the final two chapters of this fic, as well as the upcoming installments of The Slytherin Tales. As always, enjoy.

~Sensei~

* * *

In years to come, Harry would never quite remember how he had managed to get through his exams when he half expected Voldemort to come bursting through the door at any moment. Yet the days crept by, and there could be no doubt that Fluffy was still alive and well behind the locked door.

It was sweltering hot, especially in the large classroom where they did their written papers. They had been given special, new quills for the exams, which had been bewitched, much to Malvora's horror, with an Anti-Cheating spell.

They had practical exams as well. Professor Flitwick called them one by one into his class to see if they could make a pineapple tap-dance across a desk. Professor McGonagall watched them turn a mouse into a snuffbox – points were given for how pretty the snuffbox was, but taken away if it had whiskers. Snape made them all nervous, breathing down their necks while they tried to remember how to make a Forgetfulness potion.

Harry did the best he could, trying to ignore the stabbing pains in his forehead, which had been bothering him ever since his trip into the forest. Goyle thought Harry had a bad case of exam nerves because Harry couldn't sleep, but the truth was that Harry kept being woken by his old nightmare, except that it was now worse than ever because there was a hooded figure dripping blood in it.

Draco and Malvora seemed just as nervous as Harry when it came to Voldemort. The only difference was that he didn't keep visiting them in dreams.

Draco had rejoined the group under Malvora's strict watch. She still didn't believe his story about Pansy manipulating him, but Mal needed him around to help with her studying. For the life of her, she could not figure out how to get around the Anti-Cheating quills – and Draco might have been a coward, but he had some of the highest marks among first years. So, Mal allowed him back into the group, on the condition that he helped her study, and that he never betrayed or abandoned them again. They were keeping so busy, they didn't have much time to fret about what Snape or anyone else might be up to.

Their very last exam was History of Magic. One hour of answering questions about batty old wizards who'd invented self-stirring cauldrons and they'd be free, free for a whole wonderful week until their exam results came out. When the ghost of Professor Binns told them to put down their quills and roll up their parchment, Harry couldn't help cheering with the rest.

"That was too easy," said Malvora as they joined the crowds flocking out onto the sunny grounds. "I could have done that in my sleep."

She said this after almost every exam, which assured both Draco and Harry that she wasn't too sure of herself, but instead of bringing this up, they wandered down to the lake and flopped under a tree. The Weasley twins and Lee Jordan were tickling the tentacles of a giant squid, which was basking in the warm shallows.

"I'm sure to be proud of my score," Draco said happily, leaning against the tree. "What about you, Potter? Think you did any good?"

Harry was rubbing his forehead.

"I wish I knew what this _means_!" he burst out angrily. "My scar keeps hurting – it's happened before, but never as often as this."

"Chop off your head," Malvora suggested.

"Or go to Madam Pomfrey," said Draco.

"I'm not ill," said Harry. "I think it's a warning . . . it means danger's coming . . ."

Draco and Malvora were deathly quiet.

"Stop worrying about it," Draco said finally, all snobbery back in his voice. "Dumbledore's guarding the Stone, remember? And as for Snape, I certainly wouldn't want to try again with Fluffy after almost having my leg ripped off the first time."

"You said Dumbledore was a mad old coot," Harry pointed out. "Now, you think he's the greatest wizard of all time? And we underestimated Snape before. Who knows how far he's willing to go for Voldemort?"

"Stop saying the name!" Draco whined.

"Harry, Hagrid would never let Dumbledore down, he's too stupidly loyal."

Harry shook his head. He couldn't shake off a lurking feeling that there was something he'd forgotten to do, something important and he was quite sure it had nothing to do with schoolwork or exams. He watched an owl flutter toward the school across the bright blue sky, a note clamped in its mouth. Hagrid was the only one who ever sent him letters. Hagrid would never betray Dumbledore. Hagrid would never tell anyone how to get past Fluffy . . . never. . . but –"

Harry suddenly jumped to his feet.

"What do you think you're doing?" said Draco, annoyed.

"I've just thought of something," said Harry. He had turned white. "I've got to go and see Hagrid, now."

"Wait for us!" panted Mal, hurrying to keep up. "Why are we going to see Hagrid?"

"Don't you think it's a bit odd," said Harry, scrambling up the grassy slope, "that what Hagrid wants more than anything else is a dragon, and a stranger turns up who just happens to have an egg in his pocket? How many people wander around with dragon eggs if it's against wizard law? Lucky they found Hagrid, don't you think? Why didn't I see it before?"

"He's mental," said Draco, but Harry, sprinting across the grounds toward the forest, didn't hear.

Hagrid was sitting in an armchair outside the house; his trousers and sleeves were rolled up, and he was shelling peas into a large bowl.

"Hullo," he said, smiling. "Finished yer exams? Got time fer a drink?"

"After that run? Yes, please," said Malvora, but Harry cut her off.

"No, we're in a hurry. Hagrid, I've got to ask you something. You know that night you won Norbert? What did the stranger you were playing cards with look like?"

"Dunno," said Hagrid casually, "he wouldn't take his cloak off." He saw the three of them look stunned and raised his eyebrows.

"It's not that unusual, yeh get a lot o' funny folk in the Hog's Head – that's one o' the pubs down in the village. Mighta bin a dragon dealer, mightn' he? I never saw his face, he kept his hood up."

Harry sank down next to the bowl of peas.

"What did you talk to him about, Hagrid? Did you mention Hogwarts at all?"

"Mighta come up," said Hagrid, frowning as he tried to remember. "Yeah . . . he asked what I did, an' I told him I was gamekeeper. . . He asked a bit about the sorta creatures I look after. . . so I told him. . . an' I said what I'd always really wanted was a dragon . . . an' then . . . I can' remember to well, 'cause he kept buyin' me drinks . . . Let's see . . . yeah, then he said he had the dragon egg an' we could play cards fer it if I wanted . . . but he had ter be sure I could handle it, he didn' want it ter go ter any old home . . . So I told him, after Fluffy, a dragon would be easy . . ."

"And did he – did he seem interested in Fluffy?" Harry asked, trying to keep his voice calm.

"Well – yeah – how many three-headed dogs d'yeh meet, even around Hogwarts? So I told him, Fluffy's a piec o' cake if yeh know how to calm him down, jus' play him a bit o' music an' he'll go straight off ter sleep –"

Hagrid suddenly looked horrified.

"I shouldn'ta told yeh that!" he blurted out. "Forget I said it! Hey – where're yeh goin'?"

Harry, Draco, and Malvora didn't speak to each other at all until they came to a halt in the entrance hall, which seemed very cold and gloomy after the grounds.

"We've got to go to Dumbledore," said Harry. "Hagrid told that stranger how to get past Fluffy, and it was either Snape or Voldemort under that cloak – it must've been easy, once he'd got Hagrid drunk. I just hope Dumbledore believes us. Firenze might back us up if Bane doesn't stop him. Where's Dumbledore's office?"

They looked around, as if hoping to see a sign pointing them in the right direction. They had never been told where Dumbledore lived, nor did they know anyone who had been sent to see him.

"We'll just have to –" Harry began, but a voice suddenly rang across the hall.

"What are you three doing inside?"

It was Professor McGonagall, carrying a large pile of books.

"Going off to see Professor Dumbledore," said Malvora, rather curtly.

"Going to see Professor Dumbledore?" Professor McGonagall repeated, as though this was a very fishy thing to want to do. "Why?"

Harry swallowed – now what?

"It's sort of a secret," he said, but he wished at once he hadn't, because Professor McGonagall's nostrils flared.

"Professor Dumbledore left ten minutes ago," she said coldly. "He received an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic and flew off for London at once."

"He's _gone_?" said Harry frantically. "_Now_?"

"Professor Dumbledore is a very great wizard, Potter, he has many demands on his time –"

"But this is important."

"Something you have to say is more important than the Ministry of Magic, Potter?"

"Look," said Harry, throwing caution to the winds, "Professor – it's about the Sorcerer's Stone –"

Whatever Professor McGonagall had expected, it wasn't that. The books she was carrying tumbled out of her arms, but she didn't pick them up.

"How do you know -?" she spluttered.

"Professor, I think – I _know _– that Sn – that someone's going to try and steal the Stone. I've got to talk to Professor Dumbledore."

She eyed him with a mixture of shock and suspicion.

"Professor Dumbledore will be back tomorrow," she said finally. "I don't know how you found out about the Stone, but rest assured, no one can possibly steal it, it's too well protected."

"But Professor –"

"Potter, I know what I'm talking about," she said shortly. She bent down and gathered up the fallen books. "I suggest you all go back outside and enjoy the sunshine."

But they didn't.

"It's tonight," said Harry, once he was sure Professor McGonagall was out of earshot. "Snape's going through the trapdoor tonight. He's found out everything he needs, and now he's got Dumbledore out of the way. He sent that note, I bet the Ministry of Magic will get a real shock when Dumbledore turns up."

"But what can we –"

Malvora gasped. Harry and Draco wheeled round.

Snape was standing there.

"Good afternoon," he said smoothly.

They stared at him.

"You shouldn't be inside on a day like this," he said, with an odd, twisted smile.

"We were –" Harry began, without any idea what he was going to say.

"You want to be more careful," said Snape. "Hanging around like this, people will think you're up to something. And Slytherin really can't afford to lose any more points, can it?"

Harry flushed. They turned to go outside, but Snape called them back.

"Be warned, Potter – any more nighttime wandering and I will personally make sure you are expelled. Good day to you."

He strode off in the direction of the staffroom.

Out on the stone steps, Harry turned to the others.

"Right, here's what we've got to do," he whispered urgently. "One of us has got to keep an eye on Snape – wait outside the staffroom and follow him if he leave is. Mal, you'd better do that."

"Come on," Malvora scoffed, "give me a challenge, will you?"

"And we'd better stay outside the third-floor corridor," Harry told Draco. "Come on."

Draco stood absolutely still for a moment. He was clearly regretting his promise not to abandon them.

"Draco, I swear, if you run away again, I'll tell Flint that you charmed him to get on the Quidditch team, and tell the House about how you screamed like a girl when we fought the troll, and when we were in the forest." Harry threatened.

"And I'll make your life a living hell," Malvora added, gleefully.

Draco gulped.

"Fine, let's just get to the third floor."

But that part of the plan didn't work. No sooner had they reached the door separating Fluffy from the rest of the school than Professor McGonagall turned up again and this time, she lost her temper.

"I suppose you think you're harder to get past than a pack of enchantments!" she stormed. "Enough of this nonsense! If I hear you've come anywhere near here again, I'll take fifty points from Slytherin!"

Harry and Draco went back to the common room. Harry had just said, "At least Mal's on Snape's tail," when the passageway opened up and Malvora came in.

"Well, that was pointless," she said with a sigh. "Snape came out and asked me what I was doing, so I said I was looking for Camo and he ran me off."

"Well, that's it then, isn't it?" Harry said.

The other two stared at him. He was pale and his eyes were glittering.

"I'm going out of here tonight and I'm going to try and get to the Stone first."

"You're mad!" said Draco.

For once, Malvora stood by Draco. "This is a lot bigger than just the Stone, now, Harry. . . It's really dangerous."

"SO WHAT?" Harry shouted. "Don't you understand? If Snape gets hold of the Stone, Voldemort's coming back! Haven't you heard what it was like when he was trying to take over? There won't be any Hogwarts left! He'll flatten it, or turn it into a school for the Dark Arts! If I get caught before I get the stone, well, I'll have to go back to the Dursleys and wait for Voldemort to find me there, it's only dying a bit later than I would have, because I'm never going to the Dark Side! I'm going through that trapdoor tonight and nothing you two say is going to stop me! Voldemort killed my parents, remember?"

He glared at them.

"Yeah," said Malvora faintly.

"I'll use the Invisibility Cloak," said Harry. "It's just lucky I got it back."

"Is it big enough for the three of us?" asked Malvora.

"The three of us?" asked Draco and Harry in unison.

"You can't have all the fun to yourself!" said Malvora. "Besides, I'm hoping to tame Fluffy and take him as my prize for stopping Snape and saving the day."

Draco was shaking his head. He stumbled backward. Malvora snatched his hand yanked him forward.

"And _you're _coming with us so that you don't tattle while we're gone."

"N-no, I won't!" said Draco.

"You're right, you won't, because you'll be with us." She smiled at Harry. "Just think of how famous we'll be!"

After dinner the three of them sat nervously apart in the common room. Nobody bothered them; none of the Slytherins had anything to say to Harry any more, after all. This was the first night he hadn't been upset by it. Malvora was practicing a dozen different escape spells. Harry and Draco didn't talk much.

After Blaise Zabini left, Harry ran downstairs to their dark dormitory. He pulled out the cloak and then his eyes fell on the flute Hagrid had given him for Christmas. He pocketed it to use on Fluffy – he didn't feel much like singing.

He ran back up to the common room.

"We'd better put the cloak on here, and make sure it covers all three of us – if Filch spots one of our feet wandering along on its own –"

"P-Potter, I don't want to do this," Draco suddenly whined. "I can't play brave like you and Malvora. I'm not noble and I don't want – I don't want to die."

"Who said anything about dying?" Malvora snapped. "You can't back out now." She began dragging him toward the passageway, when a figure stepped out of the shadows. It was Pansy.

"Let go of him!" she ordered.

"Parkinson?" said Harry. How much had she heard?

"You two are idiots you know," she said fiercely. "You're going to lose the House even more points and you'll get expelled."

"What do you care?" asked Malvora.

"I want _you_ to get expelled," Pansy snapped back. "But I won't let you bring Draco down with you!"

"Harry, she'll snitch on us as soon as we leave this room!" said Malvora.

"What do you want me to do?" said Harry.

Pansy stepped forward.

In a flash, Malvora had brought out her wand.

"_Petrificus Totalus!_" she cried, pointing it at Pansy.

Pansy's arms snapped to her sides. Her legs sprang together. Her whole body rigid, she swayed where she stood and then fell flat on her face, stiff as a board.

Malvora ran to turn her over. Pansy's jaws were jammed together so she couldn't speak. Only her eyes were moving, looking at them in horror.

"What've you done to her?" Harry whispered.

"I just petrified her. It's the least she deserved," said Malvora sourly. "It'll wear off eventually. Couldn't have her telling on us.

"So, Malfoy," she continued, "if you want to stay behind and explain how Parkinson got like this, be my guest."

Draco gave one horrified look at Pansy and then nodded and said, "I-I'll go."

They stepped over Pansy and pulled on the Invisibility Cloak.

But leaving Pansy lying motionless on the floor didn't feel like a very good omen. In their nervous state, every statue's shadow looked like Filch, every distant breath of wind sounded like Peeves swooping down on them.  
At the bottom of their first set of stairs, they spotted Mrs. Norris skulking near the top.

"I'd like to see her take on Camo," Mal whispered in Harry's ear. As they climbed carefully around her, Mrs. Norris turned her lamplike eyes on them, but didn't do anything.

They didn't meet anyone else until they reached the staircase up to the third floor. Peeves was bobbing halfway up, loosening the carpet so that people would trip.

"Who's there?" he said suddenly as they climbed toward him. He narrowed his wicked black eyes. "Know you're there, even if I can't see you. Are you a ghoulie or ghostie or wee student beastie?"

He rose up in the air and floated there, squinting at them.

"Should call Filch, I should, if something's a-creeping around unseen."

Draco shuddered. Harry had a sudden idea.

"Peeves," he said, in a hoarse whisper, "the Bloody Baron has his own reasons for being invisible."

Peeves almost fell out of the air in shock. He caught himself in time and hovered about a foot off the stairs.

"So sorry, your bloodiness, Mr. Baron, sir," he said greasily. "My mistake, my mistake – I didn't see you – of course I didn't, you're invisible – forgive old Peevsie his little joke, sir."

"I have business here, Peeves," croaked Harry. "Stay away from this place tonight."

"I will, sir, I most certainly will," said Peeves, rising up in the air again. "Hope your business goes well, Baron, I'll not bother you."

And he scooted off.

"Wow, Harry!" whispered Mal.

A few seconds later, they were there, outside the third-floor corridor – and the door was already ajar.

"Well, there you are," Harry said quietly, "Snape's already got past Fluffy."

Seeing the open door somehow seemed to impress upon all three of them what was facing them. Underneath the cloak, Harry turned to the other two.

"If you want to go back, I won't blame you," he said. "You can take the cloak, I won't need it now."

"Don't be so stupid," said Mal.

Draco was still, as though too afraid to make a decision.

"Want to walk all the way back to the common room on your own?" asked Mal. "You might run into You-Know-Who on his way out with the Sorcerer's Stone."

Draco yelped.

"We're all in agreement, then," said Mal. "We're coming with you."

Harry pushed the door open.

As the door creaked, low, rumbling growls met their ears. All three of the dog's noses sniffed madly in their direction, even though it couldn't see them.

"Wh-what's that?" asked Draco, pointing at its feet.

"Must be a harp," said Mal. "Snape probably left it there."

"It must wake up the moment you stop playing," said Harry. "Well, here goes . . ."

He put Hagrid's flute to his lips and blew. It wasn't really a tune, but from the first note the beast's eyes began to droop. Harry hardly drew breath. Slowly, the dog's growls ceased – it tottered on its paws and fell to its knees, then it slumped to the ground, fast asleep.

"Don't stop," Mal warned Harry as they slipped out of the cloak and toward the trapdoor. They could feel the dog's hot, smelly breath as they approached the giant heads.

"We should be able to pull the door open," said Mal, peering over the dog's back. "Wanna go first, Draco?"

"No, Melbarke, I don't!"

"Thought so." Mal gritted her teeth and stepped carefully over the dog's legs. She bent and pulled the ring of the trapdoor, which swung up and open.

"What's in there?" Draco said anxiously.

"Just a hole. We'll have to jump."

Harry, who was still playing the flute, waved at Malvora to get her attention and pointed at himself.

"You want to go first? Fine by me," said Mal. "Give the flute to Draco, unless he's too frightened to play it."

Harry hand the flute over. In the few second's silence, the dog growled and twitched, but the moment Draco began to play, it fell back into its deep sleep.

Harry climbed over it and looked down through the trapdoor. There was no sign of the bottom.

He lowered himself through the hole until he was hanging on by his fingertips. Then he looked up at Mal and said, "If anything happens to me, don't follow. Go straight to the owlery and send Hedwig to Dumbledore, right?"

"Got it," said Mal.

"See you in a minute, I hope . . ."

And Harry let go. Cold, damp air rushed past him as he fell down, down, down and –

FLUMP. With a funny, muffled sort of thump he landed on something soft. He sat up and felt around, his eyes not used to the gloom. It felt as though he was sitting on some sort of plant.

"It's okay!" he called up to the light the size of a postage stamp, which was the trapdoor, "it's a soft landing, you can jump!"

It was a few moments before Draco fell in and landed, sprawled out next to Harry.

"She pushed me," he whined. "What is this stuff?"

"Dunno, some sort of plant thing. I suppose it's here to break the fall. Come on, Malvora!"

The distant music stopped. There was a loud bark from the dog, but Mal had already jumped. She landed on Harry's other side.

"I thought I'd fall to the center of the earth," she said.

"Lucky this plant saved us," said Harry.

"Whoa!" shrieked Mal. "Don't move!"

She leapt up and struggled toward a damp wall. She had to struggle because the moment she had landed, the plant had started to twist snakelike tendrils around her ankles. As for Harry and Draco, their legs had already been bound tightly in long creeper without their noticing.

Malvora had managed to free herself before the plant got a firm grip on her. Now she watched in horror as the two boys fought to pull the plant off them, but the more they strained against it, the tighter and faster the plant wound around them.

"DON'T MOVE!" she yelled. "It's Devil's Snare!"

Draco cried out, trying to stop the plant from curling around his neck.

"Shut up, I'm trying to remember how to kill it!" said Malvora.

"Well, hurry up, I can't breathe!" Harry gasped, wrestling with it as it curled around his chest.

"Devil's Snare, Devil's Snare . . . Mother owned a Devil's Snare . . . 'Keep it in the dark, Malvora. Dark and damp –'"

"Light a fire!" Harry choked.

"Fire!" said Mal, and she whipped out her wand, waved it, muttered something, and sent a jet of bluebell flames at the plant. In a matter of second, the two boys felt it loosening its grip as it cringed away from the light and warmth. Wriggling and flailing, it unraveled itself from their bodies, and they were able to pull free.

"Your mother owned one of these?" asked Harry, as he joined her by the wall, wiping sweat of his face.

"It lived in our basement."

Draco was sobbing.

"I almost died!" he squeaked.

"Well, you can't go back now," pointed out Mal. "No way up."

"This way," said Harry, pointing down a stone passageway, which was the only way forward.

All they could hear apart from their footsteps and Draco's whimpering was the gentle drip of water trickling down the walls. The passageway sloped downward, and Harry was reminded of Gringotts. With an unpleasant jolt of the heart, he remembered the dragons said to be guarding vaults in the wizard's bank. If they met a dragon, a fully-grown dragon – Norbert had been bad enough . . .

"Do you hear that?" Mal whispered.

Harry listened. A soft rustling and clinking seemed to be coming from up ahead.

"Is it a ghost?"

"I don't know . . . sounds like wings to me."

"There's light. . . and something else."

They reached the end of the passageway and saw before them a brilliantly lit chamber, its ceiling arching high above them. It was full of small, jewel-bright birds, fluttering and tumbling all around the room. On the opposite side of the chamber was a heavy wooden door.

"Think they'll try to kill us if we cross?" said Mal.

"Probably," said Harry. "They don't look very vicious, but I suppose of they all swooped down at once . . . well, there's no other choice . . . I'll run."

He took a deep breath, covered his face with his arms, and sprinted across the room. He expected to feel sharp beaks and claws tearing at him any second, but nothing happened. He reached the door untouched. He pulled the handle, but it was locked.

The other two followed him. They tugged and heaved at the door, but it wouldn't budge, not even when Malvora tried to pick the lock.

"Hmm…" said Mal.

"What are these birds for, anyway?" asked Draco.

They watched the birds soaring overhead, glittering – _glittering?_

"They're not birds!" Harry said suddenly. "They're _keys!_ Winged keys – look carefully. So that must mean . . ." he looked around the chamber while the other two squinted up at the flock of keys. ". . .yes – look! Broomsticks! We've got to catch the key to the door!"

"But there are so many!"

Malvora examined the lock on the door.

"It's got to be a big, old-looking one – silver, same as the handle."

They each seized a broomstick and kicked off into the air, soaring into the midst of the cloud of keys. They grabbed and snatched, but the bewitched keys darted and dived so quickly it was almost impossible to catch one.

Not for nothing, though, was Harry the youngest Seeker in a century. He had a knack for spotting things other people didn't. After a minute's weaving about through the whirl of rainbow feathers, he noticed a large silver key that had a bent wing, as if it had already been caught and stuffed roughly into the keyhole.

"That one!" he called to the others. "That big one – there – no, there – with bright blue wings – the feathers are all crumpled on one side."

Malvora went speeding in the direction that Harry was pointing, crashed into the ceiling, and nearly fell off her broom.

"We've got to close in on it!" Harry called, not taking his eyes off the key with the damaged wing. "Mal, you come at it from above – Draco, stay below and stop it from going down – and I'll try and catch it. Right, NOW!"

Mal dived, Draco rocketed upward, the key dodged them both, and Harry streaked after it; it sped toward the wall, Harry leaned forward and with a nasty, crunching noise, pinned it against the stone with one hand. Mal's cheers echoed around the high chamber.

They landed quickly, and Harry ran to the door, the key struggling in his hand. He rammed it into the lock and turned – it worked. The moment the lock had clicked open, the key took flight again, looking very battered now that it had been caught twice.

"Ready?" Harry asked the other two, his hand on the door handle. They nodded. He pulled the door open.

The next chamber was so dark they couldn't see anything at all. But as they stepped into it, light suddenly flooded the room to reveal an astonishing sight.

They were standing on the edge of a huge chessboard, behind the black chessmen, which were all taller than they were and carved from what looked like black stone. Facing them, way across the chamber, were the white pieces. Harry, Draco and Mal shivered slightly – the towering white chessmen had no faces.

"Now what do we do?" Harry whispered.

"It's obvious," said Mal. "We play to the other side."

Behind the white pieces they could see another door.

"How?" said Draco nervously.

"I think," said Mal, "we have to take the places of some of the chessmen."

She walked up to a black knight and put her hand out to touch the knight's horse. At once, the stone sprang to life. The horse pawed the ground and the knight turned his helmeted head to look down at Mal.

"What is it, then? Do we have to join you to get to the other door?"

The black knight nodded. Mal turned to the other two.

"Let me think. . . We're the black pieces, obviously . . ."

Harry and Draco stayed quiet, watching Mal think. Finally, she said, "Not to brag, but I _am _the best chess player here –"

"Just tell us what to do," said Harry quickly.

"All right, Harry, you be that bishop, and Draco, stand next to him instead of that castle."

"What about you?"

"I'm a knight!" said Mal.

The chessmen seemed to have been listening, because at these words, a knight, a bishop, and a castle turned their backs on the white pieces and walked off the board, leaving three empty squares that Harry, Mal, and Draco took.

"White plays first," said Mal, peering across the board. "Here we go."

A white pawn had moved forward two squares.

Mal started to direct the black pieces. They moved silently wherever she sent them. Harry's knees were trembling. Tears were running down Draco's face. What if they lost?

"Harry – diagonally for spaces to the right."

Their first real shock came when their other knight was taken. The white queen smashed him to the floor and dragged him off the board, where he lay quite still, facedown.

"Well, now we know," said Mal, a bit shakily. "Take that bishop, Draco. Go on, don't just stand there! I won't let them take you!"

Every time one of their men was lost, the white pieces showed no mercy. Soon there was a huddle of limp black players slumped along the wall. Twice, Mal only just noticed in time that Harry and Draco were in danger. She herself darted around the board, taking almost as many white pieces as they had lost black ones.

"Almost got it," she muttered suddenly. "Let me think – hmm. . ."

The white queen turned her blank face toward him.

"There's no other way," said Mal, her face hard. "I've got to be taken."

"NO!" Harry and Draco shouted.

"Shut up! It's chess!" snapped Mal. "I know what I'm doing! I take one step forward and she'll take me and you can checkmate the king, Harry!"

"But –"

"Tell them that I went down like a warrior."

"Mal! –"

"Look, don't you want to save the Stone and be the hero and whatnot? Then let me go!"

There was no alternative.

"Too bad you can't cheat at chess," Mal said quietly, her face pale but determined. "All right, here it is."

She stepped forward, and the white queen pounced. She struck Mal hard across the chest with her stone arm, and she crashed to the floor – Draco screamed but somehow managed to stay on his square – the white queen dragged Malvora to one side. She looked as if she'd been knocked out.

Shaking, Harry moved three spaces to the left.

The white king took off his crown and threw it at Harry's feet. They had won. The chessmen parted and bowed, leaving the door ahead clear. With one last desperate look at Malvora, Harry and Draco charged through the door and up the next passageway.

"What if she's -?"

"She'll be all right," said Harry, trying to convince himself. "What do you reckon's next?"

"Well, there was Sprout's: the Devil's Snare; Flitwick's keys; McGonagall probably transfigured the chessmen; so Quirrell's and Snape's . . ."  
They had reached another door.

"All right?" Harry whispered.

Draco swallowed and nodded.

Harry pushed it open.

A disgusting smell filled their nostrils, making both of them pull their robes up over their noses. Eyes watering, they saw, flat on the floor in front of them, a troll even larger than the one they had tackled, out cold with a bloody lump on its head.

"I'm glad we didn't have to fight that one," Harry whispered as they stepped carefully over one of its massive legs. "Come on, I can't breathe."

He pulled open the next door, both of them hardly daring to look at what came next – but there was nothing very frightening in here, just a table with seven differently shaped bottles standing on it in a line.

"Snape's," said Harry. "What do we have to do?"

They stepped over the threshold, and immediately a fire sprang up behind them in the doorway. It wasn't ordinary fire either; it was purple. At the same instant, black flames shot up in the doorway leading onward. They were trapped.

Draco began to wail as Harry seized a roll of paper lying next to the bottles. Harry read it out loud.

_Danger lies before you, while safety lies behind,  
Two of us will help you, whichever you would find,  
One among us seven will let you move ahead,  
Another will transport the drinker back instead,  
Two among our number hold only nettle wine,  
Three of us are killers, waiting hidden in line.  
Choose, unless you wish to stay here forevermore,  
To help you in your choice, we give you these clues four:  
First, however slyly the poison tries to hide  
You will always find some on nettle wine's left side;  
Second, different are those who stand at either end,  
But if you would move onward, neither is your friend;  
Third, as you see clearly, all are different size,  
Neither dwarf not giant holds death in their insides;  
Fourth, the second left and the second on the right  
Are twins once you taste them, though different at first sight._

"Brilliant," moaned Draco. "We'll be stuck here forever! We'll die under here and no one will ever find us!"

"Draco, shut up," Harry said.

"No, Potter!" snapped Draco, still crying. "Look, I can't go any further. Malvora and I, we're not like you! All Mal cares about is honor and fame and dragons, and all I care about is staying alive! We don't want to save the world like you do! And it's already too late for Malvora, but as for me, I don't want to die here!"

All Harry really cared about was proving himself. For the first time, he realized that _that_ was what this was all about. He needed to go forward and fight, on his own. He needed to prove that he was more than just the boy who lived.

"If you calm down, we can figure out how to get out of this," said Harry. "I'll go on and you can go back."

Draco sniffled, but nodded. He could summon up the courage to at least do that. He took the paper from Harry and read again, quietly.

"It's just logic," he said after a long moment. "Like some of the problems they gave us on the written exams. The potions all do different things. Three are poisons, two are wine, one will go through the black fire and one will go back through the purple."

"But how do we now which to drink?"

Draco read the paper several times. Then he walked up and down the line of bottles, muttering to himself and pointing at them. At last, he took a deep breath.

"The smallest bottle should go toward the stone," he said. "The round bottle at the right end will go back."

"Are you sure?"

"I… I think so."

"Listen," said Harry, "you drink the round bottle. Go back and get Malvora. Grab brooms from the flying-key room, they'll get you out of the trapdoor and past Fluffy – go straight to the owlery and send Hedwig to Dumbledore, we need him. I might be able to hold Snape off for a while, but I'm no match for him, really."

Draco nodded.

"Sorry, Harry. If I weren't such a coward –" he started.

"Don't apologize," interrupted Harry. "You were braver today than ever before. Your father would be proud of you."

Draco had never looked so startled or pleased. He shook it off quickly and nodded.

"Try not to get yourself killed, will you Potter?" he asked, in his normal snobby drawl. He took a long drink from the round bottle at the end, and shuddered.

"It's not poison?" said Harry anxiously.

"No – but it's cold as ice."

"Quick, go, before it wears off."

Draco didn't need telling twice. He turned and walked straight through the purple fire.

Harry took a deep breath and picked up the smallest bottle. He turned to face the black flames.

"Here I come," he said, and he drained the little bottle in one gulp.

It was indeed as though ice was flooding his body. He put the bottle down and walked forward; he braced himself, he saw the black flames licking his body, but couldn't feel them – for a moment he could see nothing but dark fire – then he was on the other side, in the last chamber.

There was already someone there – but it wasn't Snape. It wasn't even Voldemort.


	12. The Man with Two Faces

**Author's Note: **This is the last chapter of this fic and I am greatful to everyone who has read thus far, as well as for all the reviews we've received. I knew that taking on the this fic wouldn't be easy, and I know that there are scenes I could have changed or ways I may have balanced the story better. I've learned a lot, especially from the reviewers, and I can only hope that you will continue to read on into the sequel, where I feel I have allowed myself more freedom with the characters and plot, hopefully improving the overall quality of the fic.

I will be posting the first chapter of the sequel immediately after this chapter. Thank you to everyone who has been patient with me and enjoyed this story. :)

* * *

It was Quirrell.

"_You!_" gasped harry.

Quirrell smiled. His face wasn't twitching at all.

"Me," he said calmly. "I wondered whether I'd be meeting you here, Potter."

"But I thought – Snape –"

"Severus?" Quirrell laughed, and it wasn't his usual quivering treble, either, but cold and sharp. "Yes, Severus does seem the type, doesn't he? So useful to have him swooping around like an over-grown bat. Next to him, who would suspect p-p-poor, stuttering P-Professor Quirrell?"

Harry couldn't take it in. This couldn't be true, it couldn't.

"But Snape tried to kill me!"

"No, no, no, _I _tried to kill you. Your friend Miss Melbarke accidentally knocked me over when she pushed that other girl into Snape at that Quidditch match. She broke my eye contact with you. Another few seconds and I'd have got you off that broom. I'd have managed it before then if Snape hadn't been muttering a countercurse, trying to save you."

"Snape was trying to _save _me?"

"Of course," said Quirrell coolly. "Why do you think he wanted to referee your next match? He was trying to make sure I didn't do it again. Funny, really . . . he needn't have bothered. I couldn't do anything with Dumbledore watching. All the other teachers thought Snape was trying to make sure Slytherin won, he _did _make himself unpopular . . . and what a waste of time, when after all that, I'm going to kill you tonight."

Quirrell snapped his fingers. Ropes sprang out of thin air and wrapped themselves tightly around Harry.

"You're too nosy to live, Potter. Scurrying around the school on Halloween like that, for I knew you'd seen me coming to look at what was guarding the Stone."

"_You _let the troll in?"

"Certainly. I have a special gift with trolls – you must have seen what I did to the one in the chamber back there? Unfortunately, while everyone else was running around looking for it, Snape, who already suspected me, went straight to the third floor to head me off – and not only did my troll fail to beat you to death, that three-headed dog didn't even manage to bite Snape's leg off properly.

"Now, wait quietly, Potter. I need to examine this interesting mirror."

It was only then that Harry realized what was standing behind Quirrell. It was the Mirror of Erised.

"The mirror is the key to finding the Stone," Quirrell murmured, tapping his way around the frame. "Trust Dumbledore to come up with something like this . . . but he's in London . . . I'll be far away by the time he gets back . . ."

All Harry could think of doing was to keep Quirrell talking and stop him from concentrating on the mirror.

"I saw you and Snape in the forest –" he blurted out.

"Yes," said Quirrell idly, walking around the mirror to look at the back. "He was on to me by that time, trying to find out how far I'd got. He suspected me all along. Tried to frighten me – as though he could, when I had Lord Voldemort on my side . . ."

Quirrell came back out from behind the mirror and stared hungrily into it.

"I see the Stone . . . I'm presenting it to my master . . . but where is it?"

Harry struggled against the ropes binding him, but they didn't give. He _had _to keep Quirrell from giving his whole attention to the mirror.

"But Snape always seemed to hate me."

"Oh, he does," said Quirrell casually, "heavens, yes. He was at Hogwarts with your father, didn't you know? They loathed each other. But he never wanted you _dead_."

"But I heard you a few days ago, sobbing – I thought Snape was threatening you . . ."

For the first time, a spasm of fear flitted across Quirrell's face.

"Sometimes," he said, "I find it hard to follow my master's instructions – he is a great wizard and I am weak –"

"You mean he was there in the classroom with you?" Harry gasped.

"He is with me where I go," said Quirrell quietly. "I met him when I traveled around the world. A foolish young man I was then, full of ridiculous ideas about good and evil. Lord Voldemort showed me how wrong I was. There is no good and evil, there is only power, and those too weak to seek it . . . Since then, I have served him faithfully, although I have let him down many times. He has had to be very hard on me." Quirrell shivered suddenly. "He does not forgive mistakes easily. When I failed to steal the Stone from Gringotts, he was most displeased. He punished me . . . decided he would have to keep a closer watch on me . . ."

Quirrell's voice trailed away. Harry was remembering his trip to Diagon Alley – how could he have been so stupid? He'd _seen _Quirrell there that very day.

Quirrell cursed under his breath.

"I don't understand . . . is the Stone _inside _the mirror? Should I break it?"

Harry's mind was racing.

_What I want more than anything else in the world at the moment, _he though, _is to find the Stone before Quirrell does. So if I look in the mirror, I should see myself finding it – which means I'll see where it's hidden! But how can I look without Quirrell realizing what I'm up to? _

He tried to edge to the left, to get in front of the glass without Quirrell noticing, but the ropes around his ankles were too tight: he tripped and fell over. Quirrell ignored him. He was still talking to himself.

"What does this mirror do? How does it work? Help me Master!"

And to Harry's horror, a voice answered, and the voice seemed to come from Quirrell himself.

"Use the boy . . . Use the boy . . ."

Quirrell rounded on Harry.

"Yes – Potter – come here."

He clapped his hands once, and the ropes binding Harry fell off. Harry got slowly to his feet.

"Come here," Quirrell repeated. "Look in the mirror and tell me what you see."

Harry walked toward him.

_I must lie, _he though desperately. _I must look and lie about what I see, that's all_.

Quirrell moved close behind him. Harry breathed in the funny smell that seemed to come from Quirrell's turban. He closed his eyes, stepped in front of the mirror, and opened them again.

He saw his reflection, pale and scared-looking first. But a moment later, the reflection smiled at him. It put its hand into it pocket and pulled out a blood-red stone. It winked and put the Stone back in its pocket – and as it did so, harry felt something heavy drop into his real pocket. Somehow – incredibly – _he'd gotten the Stone._

"Well?" said Quirrell impatiently. "What do you see?"

Harry screwed up his courage.

"I see myself shaking hands with Dumbledore," he invented. "I – I've won the House Cup for Slytherin."

Quirrell cursed again.

"Get out of the way," he said. As Harry moved aside, he felt the Sorcerer's Stone against his leg. Dare he make a break for it?

But he hadn't walked five paces before a high voice spoke, though Quirrel wasn't moving his lips.

"He lies . . . He lies . . ."

"Potter, come back here!" Quirrell shouted. "Tell me the truth! What did you just see?"

The high voice spoke again.

"Let me speak to him . . . face-to-face . . ."

"Master, you aren't strong enough!"

"I have strength enough . . . for this . . ."

Harry felt as if the Devil's Snare was rooting him to the spot. He couldn't move a muscle. Petrified, he watched as Quirrell reached up and began to unravel his turban. What was going on? The turban fell away. Quirrell's head looked strangely small without it. Then he turned slowly on the spot.

Harry would have screamed, but he couldn't make a sound. Where there should have been a back to Quirrell's head, there was a face, the most terrible face Harry had ever seen. It was chalk white with glaring red eyes and slits for nostrils, like a snake.

"Harry Potter . . ." it whispered.

Harry tried to take a step backward but his legs wouldn't move.

"See what I have become?" the face said. "Mere shadow and vapor . . . I have form only when I can share another's body . . . but there have always been those willing to let me into their hearts and minds . . . Unicorn blood has strengthened me, these past weeks. . . you saw faithful Quirrell drinking it for me in the forest . . . and once I have the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a body of my own . . . Now . . . why don't you give me that Stone in your pocket?"

So he knew. The feeling suddenly surged back into Harry's legs. He stumbled backward.

"Don't be a fool," snarled the face. "Better save your own life and join me . . . or you'll meet the same end as your parents . . . They died begging me for mercy . . ."

"LIAR!" Harry shouted suddenly.

Quirrell was walking backward at him, so that Voldemort could still see him. The evil face was now smiling.

"How touching . . ." it hissed. "I always value bravery . . . Yes, boy, your parents were brave . . . I killed your father first, and he put up a courageous fight . . . but your mother needn't have died . . . she was trying to protect you . . . Now give me the Stone, unless you want her to have died in vain."

"NEVER!"  
Harry sprange toward the flame door, but Voldemort screamed "SEIZE HIM!" and the next second, Harry felt Quirrell's hand close on his wrist. At once, a needle-sharp pain seared across Harry's scar; his head felt as though it was about to split in two; he yelled, struggling with all his might, and to his surprise, Quirrell let go of him. The pain in his head lessened – he looked around wildly to see where Quirrell had gone, and saw him hunched in pain, looking at his fingers – they were blistering before his eyes.

"Seize him! SEIZE HIM!" shrieked Voldemort again, and Quirrell lunged, knocking Harry clean off his feet, landing on top of him, bith hands around Harry's neck – Harry's scar was almost blinding him with pain, yet he could see Quirrell was howling in agony.

"Master, I cannot hold him – my hands – my hands!"

And Quirrel, though pinning Harry to the ground with his knees, let go of his neck and stared, bewildered, at his own palms – Harry could see they looked burned, raw, red, and shiny.

"Then kill him, fool, and be done!" screeched Voldemort.

Quirrell raised his hand to perform a deadly curse, but Harry, by instinct, reached up and grabbed Quirrell's face –

"AAAARGH!"

Quirrell rolled off him, his face blistering, too, and then Harry knew: Quirrell couldn't touch his bare skin, not without suffering terrible pain – his only chance was to keep hold of Quirrell, keep him in enough pain to stop him from doing a curse.

Harry jumped to his feet, caught Quirrell by the arm, and hung on as tight as he could. Quirrell screamed and tried to through Harry off – the pain in Harry's head was building – he couldn't see – he could only hear Quirrell's terrible shrieks and Voldemort's yells of, "KILL HIM! KILL HIM!" and other voices, maybe in Harry's own head, crying, "Harry! Harry!"

He felt Quirrell's arm wrenched from his grasp, knew all was lost, and fell into blackness, down . . . down . . . down . . .

* * *

Something gold was glinting just above him. The Snitch! He tried to catch it, but his arms were too heavy.

He blinked. It wasn't the Snitch at all. It was a pair of glasses. How strange.

He blinked again. The smiling face of Albus Dumbledore swam into view above him.

"Good afternoon, Harry," said Dumbledore.

Harry stared at him. Then he remembered: "Sir! The Stone! It was Quirrell! He's got the Stone! Sir, quick –"

"Calm yourself, dear boy, you are a little behind the times," said Dumbledore. "Quirrell does not have the Stone."

"Then who does? Sir, I –"

"Harry, please relax, or Madam Pomfrey will have me thrown out."

Harry swallowed and looked around him. He realized he must be in the hospital wing. He was lying in a bed with white linen sheets, and next to him was a table piled high with what looked like half the candy shop.

"Tokens from your friends and admirers," said Dumbledore, beaming. "What happened down in the dungeons between you and Professor Quirrell is a complete secret, so, naturally, the whole school knows."

"How long have I been in here?"

"Three days. Mr. Malfoy and Miss Melbarke will be most relieved you have come round, they have been extremely worried."

"But sir, the Stone –"

"I see you will not be distracted. Very well, the Stone. Professor Quirrell did not manage to take it from you. I arrived in time to prevent that, although you were doing very well on your own, I must say."

"You got there? You got the owl?"

"We must have crossed in midair. No sooner had I reached London than it became clear to me that the place I should be was the one I had just left. I arrived just in time to pull Quirrell off you –"

"It was _you_."

"I feared I might be too late."

"You nearly were, I couldn't have kept him off the Stone much longer –"

"Not the Stone, boy, you – the effort involved nearly killed you. For one terrible moment there, I was afraid it had. As for the Stone, it has been destroyed."

"Destroyed?" said Harry blankly. "But your friend – Nicolas Flamel –"

"Oh, you know about Nicolas?" said Dumbledore, sounding quite delighted. "You _did_ do the thing properly, didn't you? Well, Nicolas and I have had a little chat, and agreed it's all for the best."

"But that means he and his wife will die, won't they?"

"They have enough Elixir stored to set their affairs in order and then, yes, they will die."

Dumbledore smiled at the look of amazement on Harry's face.

"To one as young as you, I'm sure it seems incredible, but to Nicolas and Perenelle, it really is like going to bed after a very, _very _long day. After all, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure. You know, the Stone was really not such a wonderful thing. As much money and life as you could want! The two things most human beings would choose above all – the trouble is, humans do have a knack of choosing precisely those things that are worst for them."

Harry lay there, lost for words. Dumbledore hummed a little and smiled at the ceiling.

"Sir?" said Harry. "I've been thinking . . . Sir – even if the Stone's gone, Vol- I mean, You-Know-Who –"

"Call him Voldemort, Harry. Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself."

"Yes, sir. Well, Voldemort's going to try other ways of coming back, isn't he? I mean, he hasn't gone, has he?"

"No, Harry, he has not. He is still out there somewhere, perhaps looking for another body to share . . . not being truly alive, he cannot be killed. He left Quirrell to die; he shows just as little mercy to his followers as his enemies. Nevertheless, Harry, while you may only have delayed his return to power, it will merely take someone else who is prepared to fight what seems a losing battle next time – and if he is delayed again, and again, why, he may never return to power."

Harry nodded, but stopped quickly, because it made his head hurt. Then he said, "Sir, there are some other things I'd like to know, if you can tell me . . . things I want to know the truth about . . ."

"The truth." Dumbledore sighed. "It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution. However, I shall answer your questions unless I have a very good reason not to, in which case I beg you'll forgive me. I shall not, of course, lie."

"Well . . . Voldemort said that he only killed my mother because she tried to stop him from killing me. But why would he want to kill me in the first place?"

Dumbledore sighed very deeply this time.

"Alas, the first think you ask me, I cannot tell you. Not today. Not now. You will know, one day . . . put it from your mind for now, Harry. When you are older . . . I know you hate to hear this . . . when you are ready, you will know."

And Harry knew it would be no good to argue.

"But why couldn't Quirrell touch me?"

"Your mother died to save you. If there is one thing Voldemort cannot understand, it is love. He didn't realize that love as powerful as your mother's for you leaves its own mark. Not a scar, no visible sign . . . to have loved so deeply, even though the person who loved us is gone, will give us some protection forever. It is in your very skin. Quirrell, full of hatred, greed, and ambition, sharing his soul with Voldemort, could not touch you for this reason. It was agony to touch a person marked by something so good."

Dumbledore now became very interested in a bird out on the windowsill, which gave Harry time to dry his eyes on the sheet. When he had found his voice again, Harry said, "And the Invisibility Cloak – do you know who sent it to me?"

"Ah – your father happened to leave it in my possession, and I thought you might like it." Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Useful things . . . your father used it mainly for sneaking off to the kitchens to steal food when he was here."

"And there's something else . . ."

"Fire away."

"Quirrell said Snape –"

"_Professor _Snape, Harry."

"Yes, him – Quirrell said he hates me because he hated my father. Is that true?"

"Well, they did rather detest each other. And then, your father did something Snape could never forgive."

"What?"

"He saved his life."

"_What?_"

"Yes . . ." said Dumbledore dreamily. "Funny, the way people's minds work, isn't it? Professor Snape couldn't bear being in your father's debt . . . I do believe he worked so hard to protect you this year because he felt that would make him and your father even. Then he could go back to hating your father's memory in peace . . ."

Harry tried to understand this but it made his head pound, so he stopped.

"And sir, there's one more thing. . ."

"Just the one?"

"How did I get the Stone out of the mirror?"

"Ah, now, I'm glad you asked me that. It was one of my more brilliant ideas, and between you and me, that's saying something. You see, only one who wanted to _find _the stone – find it, but not use it – would be able to get it, otherwise they'd just see themselves making gold or drinking Elixir of Life. My brain surprises even me sometimes . . . Now, enough questions. I suggest you make a start on these sweets. Ah! Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans! I was unfortunate enough in my youth to come across a vomit-flavored one, and since then I'm afraid I've rather lost my liking for them – but I think I'll be safe with a nice toffee, don't you?"

He smiled and popped the golden-brown bean into his mouth. Then he choked and said, "Alas! Ear wax!"

Madam Pomfrey, the nurse, was a nice woman, but very strict.

"Just five minutes," Harry pleaded.

"Absolutely not."

"You let Professor Dumbledore in . . ."

"Well, of course, that was the headmaster, quite different. You need _rest_."

"I am resting, look, lying down and everything. Oh, go on, Madam Pomfrey . . ."

"Oh, very well," she said. "But five minutes _only_."

And she let Draco and Malvora in.

"_Harry!_"

Malvora looked ready to fling her arms around him, but Harry was glad she held herself in as his head was still very sore.

"We thought you were completely dead! We're famous Harry! Everyone's talking about us!"

Even Draco was smiling.

"What really happened, anyway?" he asked.

It was one of those rare occasions when the true story is even more strange and exciting than the wild rumors. Harry told them everything: Quirrell; the mirror; the Stone; and Voldemort. Draco and Mal were a very good audience; they gasped in all the right places, and when Harry told them what was under Quirrell's turban, Mal grabbed her face in horror.

"Then the Stone is destroyed?" said Draco finally. "What a waste."

"That's what I thought, but Dumbledore thinks that – what was it? – 'to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.'"

"I told you he was entirely mental," said Draco, impressed with himself.

"So what happened to you two?" said Harry.

"I managed to get back to Malvora," said Draco. "She was even stubborn in her sleep – it took me almost fifteen minutes to wake her up –"

"Then," Mal intervened, "we ran back to the broomsticks and shot out of the trapdoor and battled the vicious beast – almost losing our very lives – and we were running toward the owlery like death was at our heels –"

"Long story short," said Draco, "we ran into Dumbledore and he already knew what was happening. He went straight for you."

"_I _think he meant to send your father's cloak, like he planned out everything!" whispered Mal.

"He's a funny man, Dumbledore," said Harry. "I think he sort of wanted to give me a chance. I think he knows more or less everything that goes on here, you know. I reckon he had a pretty good idea we were going to try, and instead of stopping us, he just taught us enough to help. I don't think it was an accident he let me find out how the mirror worked. It's almost like he thought I had the right to face Voldemort if I could . . ."

"Like I said, completely bonkers," said Draco proudly. "You'll be at the end-of-year feast tomorrow, won't you? Gryffindor won the Cup," he scowled.

"And Hufflepuff completely destroyed us in the last Quidditch match. If only Draco had made that last score –"

Before Draco could snap back, Madam Pomfrey bustled over.

"You've had nearly fifteen minutes, now OUT," she said firmly.

After a good night's sleep, Harry felt nearly back to normal.

"I want to go to the feast," he told Madam Pomfrey as she straightened his many candy boxes. "I can, can't I?"

"Professor Dumbledore says you are to be allowed to go," she said sniffily, as though in her opinion Professor Dumbledore didn't realize how risky feasts could be. "And you have another visitor."

"Oh, good," said Harry. "Who is it?"

Hagrid sidled through the door as he spoke. As usual, when he was indoors, Hagrid looked too big to be allowed. He sat down next to Harry, took one look at him, and burst into tears.

"It's – all – my – ruddy – fault!" he sobbed, his face in his hands. "I told the evil git how ter get past Fluffy! I told him! It was the only thing he didn't know, an' I told him! Yeh could've died! All fer a dragon egg! I'll never drink again! I should be chucked out an' made ter live as a Muggle!"

"Hagrid!" said Harry, shocked to see Hagrid shaking with grief and remorse, great tears leaking down into his beard. "Hagrid, he'd have found out somehow, this is Voldemort we're talking about, he'd have found out even if you hadn't told him."

"Yeh could've died!" sobbed Hagrid. "An' don' say the name!"

"VOLDEMORT!" Harry bellowed, and Hagrid was so shocked, he stopped crying. "I've met him and I'm calling him by his name. Please cheer up, Hagrid, we saved the Stone, it's gone, he can't use it. Have a Chocolate Frog, I've got loads. . ."

Hagrid wiped his nose on the back of his hand and said, "That reminds me. I've got yeh a present."

"It's not a stoat sandwich, is it?" said Harry anxiously, and at last Hagrid gave a weak chuckle.

"Nah. Dumbledore gave me the day off yesterday ter fix it. 'Course, he shoulda sacked me instead – anyway, got yeh this . . ."

It seemed to be a handsome, leather-covered book. Harry opened it curiously. It was full of wizard photographs. Smiling and waving at him from every page were his mother and father.

"Sent owls off ter all yer parents' old school friends, askin' fer photos . . . knew yeh didn' have any . . . d'yeh like it?"

Harry couldn't speak, but Hagrid understood.

Harry made his way down to the end-of-year feast alone that night. He had been held up by Madam Pomfrey's fussing about, insisting on giving him one last checkup, so the Great Hall was already full. It was decked out in the Gryffindor colors of scarlet and gold to celebrate Gryffindors first win of the House Cup in seven years. A huge banner showing the Gryffindor lion covered the wall behind the High Table.

When Harry walked in there was a sudden hush, and then everybody started talking loudly at once. He slipped into a seat between Mal and Draco at the Slytherin table and tried to ignore the fact that people were standing up to look at him. Harry couldn't help a bit of pride from flooding over him.

"See, we're famous," Mal snickered.

Dumbledore arrived moments later. The babble died away.

"Another year gone!" Dumbledore said cheerfully. "And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been! Hopefully your heads are all a little fuller than they were . . . you have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts . . .

"Now, as I understand it, the House Cup here needs awarding, and the points stand thus, in fourth place, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two points; in third, Slytherin, with four hundred and twelve; Ravenclaw has four hundred and twenty-six and Gryffindor, four hundred and seventy-two.

A storm of cheering and stamping broke out from the Gryffindor table, renewing Harry's dislike for them. Even the other Houses looked pleased that Slytherin had lost. It was a sickening sight.

"Yes, yes, well done, Gryffindor," said Dumbledore. "However, recent events must be taken into account."

The room went very still. The Gryffindors' smiles faded a little.

"Ahem," said Dumbledore. "I have a few last-minute points to dish out. Let me see. Yes…"

"First – to Miss Malvora Melbarke . . ."

The grin that spread across Mal's face was humorous to say the least.

". . . for the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in many years, I award Slytherin House twenty points."

Slytherin cheers nearly raised the bewitched ceiling; the stars overhead seemed to quiver. The other Houses seemed to wilt a bit.

"Second – to Mr. Draco Malfoy . . . for being able to conquer his fear, even if momentarily, in the face of fire, I award Slytherin House twenty points."

Draco's chest couldn't have swelled any larger. He sat straight up in his seat so that everyone could have a good look at him. With only twenty points down, Slytherins up and down the table were beside themselves.

"Third – to Mr. Harry Potter . . . " said Dumbledore. The room went deadly quiet. " . . . for pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Slytherin House another twenty points."

The din was deafening. Those who could add up while yelling themselves hoarse knew that Slytherin now had four hundred and seventy-two points – exactly the same as Gryffindor. They had tied for the House Cup – if only Dumbledore had given Harry just one more point.

Dumbledore raised his hand. The room gradually fell silent.

"Determination is what won these sixty points," said Dumbledore, smiling. "The ability to stand up to our fears, or take initiative and press onward in any situation – to, for example, go to any means to protect and keep the ones we love from danger. I therefore award ten points to Miss Pansy Parkinson."

Well, Pansy did get petrified. It was only fair that she received something because of it. It seemed, her obsessive love for Draco did have its perks. But this meant. . .

Someone standing outside the Great Hall might well have thought some sort of explosion had taken place, so loud was the noise that erupted from the Slytherin table. Harry, Malvora, and Draco stood up to yell and cheer. Draco even grinned and clapped for Pansy, who fainted and was caught by a group of people.

"Which means," Dumbledore called over the storm of applause that was, of course, only coming from the Slytherins, "we need a little change of decoration."

He clapped his hands. In an instant, the scarlet hangings became green and silver; the huge Gryffindor lion vanished and the coiled Slytherin snake took its place. The Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws clapped respectfully, while the Gryffindors complained loudly about being cheated. Snape was shaking Professor McGonagall's hand, with a twisted smile. He caught Harry's eye and Harry knew at once that, despite Harry having won the points back for Slytherin, Snape's feelings toward him hadn't changed one jot. This didn't worry Harry. It seemed as though life would be back to normal next year, or as normal as it ever was at Hogwarts.

It was the best evening of Harry's life. Better than winning at Quidditch, or Christmas, or knocking out mountain trolls . . . he would never, ever forget tonight.

Harry had almost forgotten that the exam results were still to come, but come they did. To their great surprise, both he and Malvora passed with good marks; Draco had, a bit surprisingly, some of the best grades among the first years, falling only third to Hermione Granger of Gryffindor and Gregory Grayson of Ravenclaw. Draco had been hoping that Ron Weasley wouldn't have passed, but his wishes didn't come true. It was a shame, but as Malvora said, you could always get him out of the way next year.

And suddenly, their wardrobes were empty, their trunks were packed, Camo was found stalking Neville Longbottom's toad in the bathroom; notes were handed out to all students, warning them not to use magic over the holidays; Hagrid was there to take them down to the fleet of boats that sailed across the lake; they were boarding the Hogwarts Express; talking and laughing as the countryside became greener and tidier; eating Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans as they sped past Muggle towns; pulling off their wizard robes and putting on jackets and coats; pulling into platform nine and three-quarters at King's Cross station.

It took quite a while for them all to get off the platform. A wizened old guard was up by the ticket barrier, letting them go through the gate in twos and threes so they didn't attract attention by all bursting out of a solid wall at once and alarming the Muggles.

"You must come and stay this summer," said Draco to Harry. "It will certainly beat your Muggle life. I'll show you what it's like to be with a real, wizarding family."

"Thanks," said Harry, "I'll need something to look forward to."

Draco gave Malvora a look.

"I suppose _you_ want an invitation, too."

"Hmm . . . Which is worse? Staying at home with my parents, or visiting the Malfoys?" She scowled. "If only I could stay with you all summer."

People jostled them as they moved forward toward the gateway back to the Muggle world. Some of them called:

"Bye, Harry!"

"See you, Potter!"

"Famous Potter," said Mal, grinning at him.

"Not where I'm going, I promise you," said Harry.

He, Draco, and Malvora passed through the gateway together.

"There's my precious little Draco!"

It was Draco's mother, standing beside his father, whose arm was around her waist. She called them over with a wave of her gloved hand.

"Mother, Father, this is –"

"We know who he is," Mr. Malfoy interrupted. "We've heard all about the trouble you've caused with Harry Potter this year." He gave a swift smile an nodded at Harry.

"Thank you for the broomstick, Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy," said Harry.

"Only the best for our little Draco and his friends," said Mrs. Malfoy, stroking her son's hair.

"Mother!" Draco complained when Malvora's lip twitched into a smile.

"Ready, are you?"

It was Uncle Vernon, still purple-faced, still mustached, still looking furious at the nerve of Harry, carrying an owl in a cage in a station full of ordinary people. Behind him stood Aunt Petunia and Dudley, looking terrified at the very sight of Harry.

"Ah," said Mr. Malfoy, regarding the Dursley's with something like disgust, "this is your family, Potter?"

"In a manner of speaking," said Uncle Vernon. "Hurry up, boy, we haven't got all day." He walked away.

Harry hung back for a last word with Mal and Draco.

"I don't know how you survive with those fat creatures."

"I'm sorry I ever complained about my parents!" said Malvora, gaping after Uncle Vernon. "Well, have fun!" She patted Harry on the back and shook her head as if she'd never see him again.

"Oh, I will," said Harry, and they were surprised at the grin that was spreading over his face. "_They_ don't know we're not allowed to use magic at home. I'm going to have a lot of fun with Dudley this summer . . ."


End file.
